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A CONSIDERATION OF SOME INTELLECTUAL 
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‘ That they may know the Mystery of God, even Christ, in Whom are all 
the treasures of wisdom and knowledge hidden,’-—P aut THE APosTLE. 


SECOND EDITION. 


NEW YORK: . 
ANSON D. F. RANDOLPH & CO.,, 
38, WEST IWENTY-ERIRD STREET. 
1887. 


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PREFACE TO THE SECOND EDITION. | 


“ 


THE alterations made in the present edition are few, 
and, with two or three exceptions, are only slight 


verbal emendations. Two or three sentences respect- | 
ing Force, which appeared susceptible of a false inter- 


pretation, have been cancelled, and a few lines have been 
added to the closing summary of Chapter VI. to avoid 
the inconvenience of referring to a previous page. The 
only change of importance is the addition of about five 
pages on the subject of animal suffering (p. 134), which 
will, I trust, strengthen the argument on the Mystery 
of Evil by supplementing those general observations on 
apparent defects in Nature which are retained as they 
stood in the first edition. In supplying these para- 
graphs I revert to an original intention which was 
abandoned through a fear of either encumbering the 
argument with a discussion of inordinate length, or else 
of causing misunderstanding by a too fragmentary 
treatment of an enormous theme. Some-more explicit 
statement, however, of what the Bible teaches on this 
matter seemed desirable, and is now offered to the 
reader, though in a necessarily imperfect form. The 
subject is little referred to except by those who question 
the Creator’s goodness, and few Christians seem to be 


vi Preface to the Second Edition. 


aware that the Bible has a consistent doctrine concern- 
ing it. If any attempt has been made to define this 
doctrine, or to gather into a connected form the state- 
ments and suggestions of Scripture, it has escaped 
my notice. The moral difficulty is almost entirely 
a modern’ experience, and is due to that deepened 
sympathy with suffering which has been diffused by 
Christianity in conjunction with a closer and more 
scientific observation of animal life. It seems certain, 
however, that the growing pressure of this difficulty 
will constrain Christian teachers to consider it more 
attentively, and we may anticipate that, as in many 
similar cases before, the result of diligent inquiry will 
be the discovery of rich treasures of light hidden in 
the Bible—hidden only because man’s eyes have not 
been touched with the burning eye-salve of troubled 
thought. 

This preface must not close without an acknowledg- 
ment of the generous way in which the first edition has 
been received by reviewers of the most diversified 
opinions. But while thanking public writers for their 
unstinted commendations, I derive an even deeper 
satisfaction from private assurances that in not a few 
cases the great object of the work has been attained. 
Such results not only repay the labour of writing, but 
reflect a cheering light upon dark passages of mental 
history without which this volume could never have 
been written. Only one who has himself been tempted 
to renounce faith, and leave the eternal morrow to 
take thought for itself, can have full sympathy with 
those who suffer from that malady of thought which is 
so rife in modern days. In issuing a new edition my 


Preface to the Second Edttion. Vil 


earnest hope is that many whose faces I may never see 
wil find herein the touch of a friendly spirit, and some 


encouragement to fight their doubts, and face the. 
spectres of the mind, until at length they find a 


stronger faith. Human words at best are weak, yet 


‘Words are things ; anda small drop of ink Re 
Falling like dew upon a thought...’ 
may aid another mind to think of Him who is never 
far from any honest heart, and to trust the mystic 
guidance of that Power which is with us 
‘In the night, 
Which makes the darkness and the light, 
And dwells not in the light alone.’ 


mc AV Pee 
CLAPTON, iVov. 9th, 1886. 


IN. PROD U CLION, 


Tuts book is an endeavour to consider the chief 
intellectual hindrances to Christian Faith which are 
prevalent in our day. From their independent titles, 
the various chapters might appear to be self-contained 
essays on separate subjects; but unless I have failed 
in my design, it will be found that they are a con- 
secutive series of arguments, whereby a single and 
continuous line of thought is advanced. It has been 
my endeavour to dispose at the outset of the most 
fundamental objections to Christianity, and thence to 
ascend step by step, leaving no necessary foothold 
unsecured, until at length objections which proceed 
from Theists who are ‘almost Christians’ are con- 
sidered. 

In dealing with anti-Christian and non-Christian 
writers, I have striven to observe the golden rule. 
If full justice has not been done to the form and spirit 
of their arguments in the passages selected for quota- 
tion, or in the replies made, it has not been through 
any wish to disguise or evade their significance and 
force. Difficulties flinched from or minimised for 
temporary relief usually avenge themselves at some 
future time by assuming more formidable shapes; and 


Introduction. 1X 


Fis, 


oe i 
he who would help others towards the ‘yea’ of a well-* | 


assured conviction must measure with them the full 
force of every ‘nay’ which obstructs their path. 


In dealing with critical objections which, if disputed, 


would involve minute and voluminous discussions, I. 


have borne in mind a secret whispered to me by a _ 
distinguished Queen’s Counsel, who said, ‘I win my 


cases by admissions.’ A full review of Christian con- 
troversy would show that more damage has been done 
to faith by indiscreet contentions for dubious and non- 
essential points than by any hostile attacks. The fate 
of Christianity has frequently been staked by its advo- 
cates upon the defence of certain positions which have 
eventually proved indefensible. Mindful of this error, 
which has been several times repeated in our day, I 
have not contended forall that I believe, but by making 
occasional loans to the other side, have striven to show 
that the Christian faith will not be injuriously affected 
if many current controversies are ultimately decided in 
a way that the majority of Christian advocates neither 
desire nor expect. Apart from any other advantages 
which this method may possess, it will, I trust, help 
some to perceive that God’s gift does not hang on 
erammar, and that there is no valid reason why we 
should postpone faith in the oracles of God until every 
vexatious dispute about their literary vehicle has been 
terminated. 

It does not fall within the design of this book to give 
an exposition of Christian doctrines. Though adducing 
reasons for regarding Christ as Divine, I offer no meta- 
physical theory of the Incarnation, and give no theo- 
logical opinions respecting the mode of His work as 


i: 
re 
Ni 


- Introduction. 


«<> 


man’s Redeemer. The subjects treated of are prior 
to these great themes, and may with advantage be 
separately discussed. They are subjects which cannot 
be incessantly reopened by Christian preachers in their 
ordinary addresses. Without sinking into mere dis- 
puters with absent or silenced opponents, they must 
generally treat as established truths the existence of 
a Personal God, the possibility of Revelation, the 
credibility under proper safeguards of human testi- 
mony to superhuman events, and the veracity in par- 
ticular of those documents which are the avowed basis 
of their instructions. It is no secret, however, that on 
all these points multitudes have been deeply affected 
by the arguments, and especially by the tone, of much — 
contemporary literature, in which it is directly asserted 
or tacitly implied that the foundations of the Christian 
faith have been removed by modern advances in wisdom 
and knowledge. Christians are freely charged with an 
unworthy adhesion to their beliefs, not because reason- 
ably convinced of their soundness, but on account of 
their ideal beauty, their consolatory tendency, and the 
gratification they promise to the natural desires of 
mankind for happiness and continued life. To aman 
who prefers truth to the fairest of illusions, any un- 
certainty respecting the justice of these accusations 
must be unspeakably painful. If the heart is to be 
allowed free play for its affections, and its witness is 
to be entertained without the fear of self-deception, 
it is indispensable that clear convictions should be 
obtained with regard to those elementary principles 
which are so boldly challenged. 

I do not imagine that the most prevalent hindrances 


Introduction. X1 


to faith are intellectual, or that in any individual they — 
are such exclusively. The purest natures who are 
troubled with a strife between the intellect and the 
heart will confess that they are not exempt from the 
common struggles of humanity between conscience 
and inclination. Those who are most truly alive to. 
the beauty of Christ and the sublimity of the destiny 
to which He calls, will own that the conditions of 
discipleship would severely try their spirits if no mental 
uncertainties deterred.. The life of faith is not a mere 
assent of the intellect to certain propositions, and 
it cannot therefore be produced by logic. But faith 
must needs include some convictions which may be 
put into propositions, and either be denied or affirmed 
by the reason. The author of the Epistle to the 
Hebrews justly regards it as an axiom that ‘he that 
cometh to God must believe that He is, and that He 
is a rewarder of them that seek after Him.’ Therefore 
a denial or a doubt of the several affirmations into 
which this sentence may be resolved must preclude the 
existence of faith in its higherand more spiritual form. 
Moral hindrances can only be removed by moral suasion 
or discipline. Spiritual hindrances can only be removed 
by spiritual influences. But intellectual doubts which 
relate to matters of historic fact, physical possibility, 
or rational probability, can only be removed by appeals 
to the understanding. When the mind has been con- 
vinced, a man may still be destitute of personal trust 
in God, but a channel will be opened through which 
appeals to his conscience and affections may afterwards 
be made. 

If the thoughts presented in this book should avail 


Xil | Introduction. 


to clear from any minds some intellectual hindrances 
to faith, and should allay the misgivings of others who 
believe, yet feel some tremors when heavy blows are 
dealt against the deepest foundations of their. creéd, 
I shall feel well rewarded. I should not regard any 
work as wasted if it speeded one troubled thinker to 
the place where Nicodemus stood when he said to 
Jesus, ‘ Rabbi, we know that Thou art a teacher come 
from God, for no man can do those things which Thou 
doest except God be with him’ ;.or where Philip stood 
on the night before the Crucifixion, saying, ‘ Lord, 
show us the Father, and it sufficeth us.’ Believing as 
I do far more concerning Christ than is here written, 
I am persuaded that all who accept Him as the * faith- 
ful and true Witness’ concerning unseen and eternal 
things will in due time come to know Him as the 
revealed ‘Mystery of God’; and regarding Him as 
the Word, the Utterance of the Eternal Mind, will 
confess that in Him there must needs be hidden for 
our enlightenment ‘all the treasures of wisdom and 
knowledge.’ 


CSAC UNH TE aN neon 


toes 
PREFACE TO SECOND EDITION - - - 
INTRODUCTION - - : - - - 
I. MATERIALISM - > - - - - 
II.. PANTHEISM - - - - - - 
III. THEISM - “ oa : 2 3 : 
IV. THE STRAITS OF THEISM WITHOUT REVELATION - 
V. THE MYSTERY OF EVIL - - - - 
VI. THE MIRACLE OF REVELATION - - - 
VII. THE ORACLES OF GOD ~ - - - 
Section I.—The Place of a Book in Revelation - 
I].—The Method and Spirit of Inquiry con- 
cerning the Bible - - - 
I1J:—Some Elementary Facts respecting the 
Bible - - - - 
IV.—The Unity of the Bible - - - 
V.—The alleged Verbal Infallibility of the 
Bible - - - - - 
VI.—The General Credibility of the Bible - 
VIl.—The Presence of Divine Elements in the 
Bible - - - - - 
» VIII.—The Prevalence of Divine Elements in 
the Bible - . A 
VIII. THE PERSON OF CHRIST - = = “ 
IX. THE RESURRECTION OF CHRIST - - - 
X. THE LIFE OF FAITH - - - s 


3? 


” 


oP) 


‘ For life, with all it yields of joy and ue, 

And hope and fear ....+.. : 

Ts just our chance 0 the prize ae Lape love, 

How love might be, hath been indeed, and ts ; 

And that we hold thenceforth to the uttermost 

Such prize despite the envy of the world, 

And, having gained truth, keep truth: that ts all.’ 

ROBERT BROWNING. 


‘And still the skies are opened as of old 

To the entranced gaze, ay, nearer far 

And brighter than of yore ; and Might is there, 
And Infinite Purity ts there, and high 

Eternal Wisdom, and the calm clear face 

Of Duty, and a higher, stronger Love 

And Light in one, and a new, reverend Naiie, 
Greater than any and combining all ; 

And over all, veiled with a veil of cloud, 

God set far off, too bright for mortal eyes.’ 

Lewis Morris. 


THE 


MYSTERY OF GOD. 


Gon ALi el ee 0: 


MATERIALISM. 


FRom the well at Sychar the voice of Christ has gone 
out into all the earth, saying, ‘God is a Spirit.” To 
men who thirst ‘ for the living God,’ He declares that 
He is a Father whose desire is towards His offspring, 
and who seeks for their reverence and love. If these 
things are so, there must be ‘a spirit in man,’ and 
intercourse between the Divine Father and his human 
children is possible. A life of faith in the Unseen God 
thus becomes man’s reasonable service, and religion in 
the Christian sense must consist in the maintenance 
of filial intercourse with the Father, and the loyal dis- 
charge of all those duties which paternal wisdom may 
assign. 

Materialism strikes at the root of these ideas by say- 
ing, ‘ There is no spirit. There is only one substance 
known to us—viz., matter—and this is sufficient to 
account for all the facts of human consciousness and 
of the universe around. Thought and feeling are only 
products of matter highly organized. God and im- 


mortality are dreams.’ 
. ey 


2 The Mystery of God. 


In this ‘dogmatic shape the creed has comparatively 
_ few professors. Although positive in form, it involves 
immense negations, from which cautious minds draw 
back. It presents no allurement to the heart, and 
affords no incentive to social duty. But although from 
these causes its open champions are not numerous, 
it practically underlies most of those anti-Christian 
theories which are rife in our day. Various parties 
which busy themselves with devices to render life bear- 
able and society possible without the recognition of 
God, put other and more inviting names on their 
banners, but their schemes are none the less based on 
an assumption that materialism is true. The theory, 
moreover, gives a philosophical expression to the un- 
reasoned opinions of multitudes who are indifferent to 
all world-bettering plans and enthusiasms, and have 
bidden farewell to all personal aspirations which look 
beyond the narrow range of immediate interests and 
desires. The theory is also important because many 
who regard it with repugnance are disquieted by the 
confident tone of its advocates, who say continually, 
‘Where is- now your God?’ While the convic- 
tion, or even a strong suspicion, remains that 
matter is all, God an illusion, and worship the 
outpouring of emotion into nothingness, men have 
no heart to study the historic evidences of Christianity, 
or to consider the Person of Christ. On many grounds, 
therefore, it becomes needful to so far examine the 
Materialistic theory of the universe as to ascertain 
whether it affords a reasonable and scientific basis for 
a godless life. 


In pursuing this inquiry, it will be useful to trace the 


Materialisnt. a 


origin and growth of current theories, for by so doing 
we shall not merely investigate abstract opinions, but 
follow the lines of reasoning by which they have 
been reached, and catch some glimpses of the men 
who helped to form them, and were in part formed 
by them. The advantage of such a course could 
scarcely be better expressed than in the words of the 
late Professor Ferrier relative to the general study of 
the History of Philosophy: ‘ We shall find that we 
are, in fact, studying the development of our own reason 
in its most essential forms, with this difference, that the 
great problem which in our minds is worked out ina 
hurried manner, and within contracted limits, is evolved 
at leisure in the history of philosophy, and presented in 
juster and more enlarged proportions. The history of 
philosophy is, in fact, philosophy itself taking its time, 
and seen through a magnifying-glass.’* 

If we turn first of all to the Bible as our most 
familiar treasury of ancient religious thought, we find 
clear records of Materialism. The author of ‘ Eccle- 
siastes’ gives utterance to many gloomy notions, which 
show that in his day there were Hebrews who held that 
men were no better than the beasts. These passages 
are so familiar, that it is needless to quote them here. 
It should be observed, however, that the royal preacher 
found Materialism a very gloomy creed, paralysing all 
endeavours after righteousness, mingling wormwood 
with every cup of pleasure, and throwing a cold shadow 
over the beauty of nature and the whole course of 
human life from birth to death. This despondency 
will generally be found haunting the Materialist; and 


* Professor Ferrier’s Works, Vol. II., p. 2. 
i= 2 


4 The Mystery of God. 


the rejection of morality, so conspicuous in parts of 
-* Ecclesiastes,’ will be found the invariable outcome of 
Materialistic belief as we trace it downwards to our 
own day. | 

According to the statements of Mencius, a gross 
system of Materialism, founded by Yang-Choo, was 
widely spread over the Chinese empire about the close 
of the fourth, or early in the third century before 
Christ. Its author had the full courage of his convictions, 
and advocated the freest indulgence of every appetite 
as the only real enjoyment within man’s reach. 
*'Wherein people differ,’ he wrote, ‘is the matter of 
life ; wherein they agree is death. While they are alive 
we have the distinctions of intelligence and stupidity, 
honorableness and meanness; when they are dead we 
have so much stinking rottenness, decaying away :— 
this is the common lot. Yet intelligence and stupidity, 
honorableness and meanness, are not in one’s power, 
neither is that condition of putridity, decay and utter 
disappearance .... All are born and.all die; the in- 
telligent and the stupid, the honorable and the mean. 
At ten years oldsome die. The virtuous and the sage 
die; the ruffian and the fool die also.’ Because of 
these things, he counselled men to renounce scruples 
about propriety and righteousness as sheer folly; 
seizing all possible pleasures with avidity, and enduring 
inevitable evils with cynical contempt. ‘Being once 
Born, take your life as it comes and endure it; and 
seeking to enjoy yourself as you desire, so await the 
approach of death. When you are about to die, treat 
the thing with indifference and endure it; seeking to 
accomplish your departure, so abandon yourself to 


Materiali sie. & 


annihilation.’ To show the nothingness of virtue and 
praise, Yang-Choo related the lives of four -sages 
who encountered great hardships and afflictions, and 
at last went down sorrowfully to the grave. ‘Since 
their death,’ he observed, ‘they have had a grand fame 
that will last through myriads of ages. But that fame 
is what no one who cares for what is real would choose. 
Celebrate them; they do not know it. Reward them ; 
they do not know it. Their fame is no more to them 
than to the trunk of a tree or a clod of earth.’ In con- 
trast to these ‘sages’ he described the careers of two 
‘villains,’ who never made themselves ‘bitter by the 
thought of propriety and righteousness,’ and came 
brightly to death. ‘ During their life they had the joy 
of gratifying their desires. Since their death they have 
had the evil fame of folly and tyranny. But the reality 
of enjoyment is what no fame can give. Reproach 
them; they do not know it. Praise them; they do not 
know it. Their ill fame is no more to them than to 
the trunk of a tree, or to a clod of earth’”* Sucha 
theory presents no novel features, but deserves atten- 
tion because so similar to many others with which we 
are familiar. Although an isolated Chinese philoso- 
pher, Yang-Choo seems in many places a mere echo of 
the Hebrew preacher, and is chiefly remarkable for the 
assumed gaiety with which he discusses the emptiness 
of life which graver natures lament. 

In India, it is said that only one—and that a some- 
what obscure—philosophy is Materialistic. It has, 


* ‘The Chinese Classics,’ by Dr. James Legge, Vol. II., pp. 97; 
98, 100. 


6 The Mystery of God. 


indeed, been well pointed out that the Hindoo mind 
is too mystical and imaginative to find contentment in 
a system so essentially prosaic. 

The historic sources of modern European Materialism 
have to be sought in Greece. In the seventh century 
before Christ, Thales, the ‘ father of philosophy,’ began 
the long labour of searching after the cause and primary 
element of all that is. He could not, like the multitude, 
rest content with the ancient myths which Homer and 
Hesiod had beautified, nor could he silence the questions 
which arose in his own mind concerning the origin of 
things. His conclusion was, that the only permanent 
and real thing in the universe is water. Aristotle says 
that probably he arrived at this opinion from observing 
that the seeds of all things are moist, that all nourish- 
ment is moist, that heat is generated from moisture, 
and that life is sustained by heat.* This, however 
childish it may seem to modern ears, was a wonderful 
effort of thought in his day, and was the germ of all 
truly scientific observation. Cicero ascribes to Thales 
a belief in an all-presiding and framing mind,t but 
Aristotle was far more likely to be correct. After 
Thales, Anaximander taught that matter was the be- 
ginning and end of all things, but he only qualified it 
as indeterminate or chaotic substance. Then followed 
Anaximenes, who fixed on air, and his pupil Diogenes 
of Apollonia, who added that air is sensible and intel- 
ligent. Heraclitus is generally said to have contended 
against these theories in favour of fire, but it is doubt- 


* ‘Metaphysics,’ Book I., chap. iii. 
+ ‘Nature of the Gods,’ Book I., chap. x. 


Materialisna. 4 


ful whether fire was anything more to him than an 
emblem of ceaseless motion. 

Democritus first propounded the famous atomic 
theory which through many changes has survived until 
our day. He taught that matter is eternal, and that it 
consists of minute atoms so small as to be incapable of 
division, and alike in every quality, though of various 
shapes and sizes. Between these atoms he saw that 
there must be space, or else they would not be divided. 
Hence he said the universe consists of atoms and space, 
or the ‘full and the void.’ All apparent differences of 
objects are due to the shape of the atoms composing 
them; ¢.g., the atoms of water are round and smooth 
and loosely grouped, those of iron are jagged and un- 
even. The soul of man he held to be only a body 
within the body made of the most delicate atoms. To 
explain the movement of atoms and their coming into 
the forms we see in Nature, he affirmed that all is due 
to law and necessity. Things come to be what they 
are because they must. These atoms began by falling 
through infinite space, and being of different shapes 
and sizes, jostled one another, and so whirling about, 
formed vortices, and thence worlds, in infinite number, 
and furthermore sea and land, plants, animals, and 
men. 

It is interesting to observe in passing that about the 
same time as Democritus founded the atomic school of 
Materialism, another system of thought, destined to 
fight against it for ages, was originated by Anaxagoras. 
From the orderly arrangement of Nature, and from the 
constitution of man, he inferred the existence of an all- 
designing Mind or Reason. This was the historic 


8 The Mystery of God. 


germ of the so-called ‘Argument from Design.’ It isa 
' very simple train of reasoning, and one which must 
have prevailed from the time when man first gazed on 
Nature with an inquiring mind, although false and 
absurd notions of finite deities hindered men from pur- 
suing a path which many now deem too obvious to be 
overlooked. Thales and his school were needed to 
clear men’s minds of superstition before reason was 
able to tread a path more childlike ages had found easy. 
So negative criticism of popular opinions has often 
done good service to the human mind and to the cause 
of religious faith. Thales seemed to sweep away 
religion for thoughtful Greeks, but he only cleared 
away thickets of fable from the slopes of Mount 
Olympus. Anaxagoras went up and saw in the mount 
an infinite intelligence as God. To him men like 
Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle gave heed, and through 
all generations his argument has done battle with 
Materialistic creeds, and is confessed by men like J.S. Mill 
to be the strongest plea for the existence of God which 
man’s intellect can frame or understand. Concerning 
its author, the dictum of Aristotle is well worth quoting: 
“Whoever affirmed mind, as in animals, so also in 
Nature, to be the cause of the system of the world, and 
of the entire harmony of it, the same appeared like a 
man in his sober senses in comparison with the vain 
theorists of the earlier ages.’* 

After Democritus there arose the Sophists, a class of 
professional teachers called into existence by the 
wealth and mental activity of the age of Pericles. 
They taught the arts of success in life in a Materialistic 


* ‘Metaphysics, Book I., chap. iii. 


Materialism. 9 


sense, and insisted that true and false, good and evil, 
have no existence except by convention. They were 
extreme agnostics, denying man’s power to know any- 
thing but his own sensations, and counselling their — 
pupils to let the atoms of Democritus and the Universal 
Reason of Anaxagoras alone. 

Against them Socrates expended the splendid energies 
of his mind. He followed Anaxagoras in affirming 
that thought underlies sense, and that the soul is more 
than the body, and will survive its dissolution. He 
insisted that man has a moral nature and aconscience. 
That Godis Eternal Mind and Justice, and Ruler over 
all. There is a truth and a goodness for men to seek 
and find. His disciple Plato and Aristotle followed, 
each taking a different line of thought, but both oppos- 
ing with all their might the spread of Materialistic 
Atheism. Their systems were great achievements, 
and deserve the homage and gratitude of mankind. 
But they were mixed up with many unavoidable errors 
in physics, and lacked adaptation to ordinary men. In 
spite of their endeavours, Greek thought became in- 
creasingly Materialistic, and before Christ came into 
the world the atomic theory, revived by Epicurus, and 
preached by Lucretius, had become the prevalent 
opinion. Pilate’s hopeless question, ‘ What is Truth?’ 
is a type of the mental attitude which prevailed among 
most cultivated men in his day. 

Epicurus wrought out the practical inferences from 
the Materialistic theory in an attractive shape. He 
taught that pleasure is the great end of life, and that 
wisdom lies in discovering and carrying out that 
scheme of conduct which will conduce to the greatest 


ite) The Mystery of God. 


amount of pleasure for the longest time. The pursuit 
‘of truth he deemed an idle waste of energy. The 
theory of Democritus chiefly commended itself to him 
because, with certain modifications, it left man freest 
to please himself without disturbing fears of the gods. 
His great distinction is, that he gave his name to a 
system of life and thought as diametrically opposed to 
that symbolised by the cross as the wit of man could 
devise. 

The chief prophet and poet of Materialism was the 
Roman Lucretius. He possessed a marvellous power 
of clear statement, and his poem on ‘The Nature of 
Things’ is a -most beautiful specimen of abstruse 
reasoning clothed in a literary form. He was not, 
strictly speaking, the author of the theories he pro- 
pounded and adorned, but they may be best discussed 
in connection with his work, and may for brevity be 
spoken of as his. 

The chief aim which Lucretius set before himse! 
was not the scientific elucidation of truth for its own 
sake, but the emancipation of mankind from the tyranny 
of all painful and perturbing ideas. He saw that the 
religious beliefs of his countrymen were a source of 
neither solace nor courage, but rather of cowardly fears. 
The gods of Greece and Rome did not deter their wor- 
shippers from crime, yet filled them with gloomy antici- 
pations of future torment. Whether he believed there 
really were such beings is doubtful. He apostrophized 
them freely in his poem, but this may have been simply 
for embellishment or as a concession to popular super- 
stitions. Whether superhuman beings existed or not, 
he affirmed and laboured to prove that they neither 


Matertalisnz. II 


produced the system of nature nor could destroy it, and 
that after death man would simply be dissolved into 
the atoms of which he was composed. Death, he 
reasoned, need have no dreadfulness to those who, 
when life fails, will simply cease to be, or, as a modern 
Lucretian puts it, will have melted, ‘like streaks of 
morning cloud,’ ‘into the infinite azure of the past.’ 

The first principles of Lucretius are these: at 
nothing is ever divinely generated from nothing.’ 
‘Nature resolves each thing into its own constituent 
elements, and does not reduce anything to nothing.’ 
‘Nature carries on her operations by imperceptible 
particles.’ ‘These bodies which completely fill 
space can neither be broken in BIECESen” oe TOL 
again can be decomposed.’ ‘The primary atoms are 
solid and without void. They must of necessity be 
eternal.’ ‘There is space intangible, empty, and 
vacant. If this were not the case, things could by 
no means be moved, for that which is the quality of 
body, viz., to obstruct and to oppose, would be present 
at all times, and would be exerted against all bodies.’ 
‘This space is unbounded by extremities.’ ‘No third 
nature, therefore, distinct in itself, besides vacant 
space, can possibly be left undiscovered in the sum of 
things; no third kind of being which can at any time 
fall under the notice of the senses, or which anyone 
can find out by the exercise of his reason.’ ‘ Whatso- 
ever other things are said to be, you will find them to 
be either necessary adjuncts of these two things or 
accidents of them.’* 

So far as these principles go they are maintained 


* Lucretius ‘On the Nature of Things,’ Book f. 


[2 The Mystery of God. 


substantially by modern writers, who state the evolution 
‘theory ina Materialistic form. They affirm these atoms 
to exist, and discern in them ‘the promise and potency 
of all terrestrial life.’ Professor Tyndall quotes with 
approbation the words of Lucretius: ‘ Nature is seen 
to do all things spontaneously of herself without the 
meddling of the gods.’* This opinion will have to bear 
closer criticism later on; but it must be remarked here 
that the existence of these atoms was only inferred by 
Lucretius, and they still remain outside the range of 
verified knowledge. They are the objects of faith to 
the Materialist, for no man ever saw one. Sir W. 
Thomson holds, in opposition to the atomic theory, 
that the primary substance is a perfect fluid, which fills 
all space without any void being left. He thinks that 
atoms are only the rotating portions of this fluid; and 
this theory is sustained by some of the most exquisite 
mathematical calculations and experiments in what is 
called vortex motion. I offer no opinion on the merits 
of these rival theories. A few generations hence, per- 
haps, the question will be settled. Meanwhile, let us 
remember that the atomic theory is theory only and 
not scientific knowledge. The Materialist can no 
more show us an atom or a primary fluid than the 
Theist can show us God. No man by his senses can 
perceive the one or the other. All he can rightly say 
of ‘either, is'‘ I believe. The most dogmatie creeds 
produced by Christendom are not so presumptuous as 
to say, ‘I know.’ It were well if all professors of 
science were as diffident, when their teachings are 
carried beyond the limits of demonstration. 


* * Belfast Address,’ p. 55. 


Materialisi. i 


Assuming the existence of atoms strewn over in- 
finite space, Lucretius had still to show how they 
came together, to make a beginning of organized 
nature. Here he encountered the tremendous problem 
of accounting for motion without a mover. He knew of 
motion caused by one body striking on another; but 
this left unanswered the question, ‘What caused the 
body to move?’ Space could not do it, and he had 
denied the existence of anything but void space and 
atoms; therefore he had to boldly say it was the 
property of atoms to move. He knew the law of 
gravitation in a loose kind of way—i.c., he knew that 
all bodies fall by their own weight until sustained by 
something. solid. Therefore, like Democritus, he 
pictured the earliest state of things as a sort of infinite 
cataract of atoms falling in infinite space. The ab- 
surdity of this from a modern point of view need 
scarcely be stated. There is of course no up and no 
down in space. ‘Up’ to us simply means away from 
our earthly centre of gravity, and ‘down’ the reverse. 
The only lines of up and down therefore with which we 
are acquainted are not parallel lines, as Lucretius 
supposed, but the radii of a circle running outwards in 
every possible direction into space. Lucretius, how- 
ever, although unsuccessful, exhibits much ingenuity 
in trying to get his atoms into motion and collision. 
Democritus had said that, falling through a vacuum in 
a straight line, the larger atoms went faster than the 
small, and so collided, and went whirling round and 
round until they mingled and formed worlds. But 
Aristotle, with all his errors in physics, was able to 
point out that in a perfect vacuum, which of course 


14 The Mystery of God. 


offers no resistance, large and small bodies would fall 

at the same rate, and so would never touch. Lucretius 
admitted this; ‘but,’ said he, ‘the atoms do not fall in 
perfectly straight lines.” To meet the criticism of those 
who said, ‘ This is contrary to observation,’ he frankly 
admitted that it was so, as far as heavy and visible 
bodies are concerned, but denied that it was of neces- 
sity true of bodies so small as to be imperceptible. 
‘You may yourself see,’ he observed, ‘that heavy bodies 
never turn aside without being turned.’ ‘ But who is 
there,’ he inquired, ‘ that can see that atoms do not at 
all turn themselves aside, even in the least, from the 
straight direction of their course ?’* 

This was the only escape he could devise. He first 
invented an unreasonable idea, and then treated it as 
fact. This notion, that atoms behave themselves when 
out of human sight in a way which large bodies would 
be ashamed to imitate when under observation, should 
be very amusing to professors of the exact sciences. But 
Lucretius is a warning in this, that assertions of ‘ what 
is,’ and what ‘ must be,’ in regions that transcend ex- 
perience, are very dangerous things for Materialists to 
indulge in, even in our day. It may indeed be well for 
all of us to remember that while we have ancestors 
whose random theories and rash assumptions we criti- 
cise, with now and then a little mirth, we shall also, 
should the present order of nature continue a little 
longer, have a posterity who in their turn will criticise 
us. i 

Another point of great interest and suggestiveness 
in the Lucretian theory of motion demands a passing 


* *Lucretius,’ Book II. 


Materialisne. 15 


notice. Materialists to-day are all Necessitarians. 
They are bound to deny free-will in man, because they 
say that all his passions and thoughts are mere effects 
of organized substance. The late W. K. Clifford said, 
‘A moving. molecule of inorganic matter possesses a 
small piece of mind stuff.’ This is, of course, a mere 
truism, from a Materialistic point of view, and hence it 
follows by inexorable logic that you cannot have free 
volition in man unless there be volition in the stuff of 
which his mind is made. Lucretius was well aware 
of this, and stated it as plainly as the English Professor. 
But he did a fine stroke of business for his theory by 
reversing the process pursued by so many of his 
modern disciples. They say, in substance, ‘ There is no 
free-will in atoms; therefore there is none in organized 
matter; and as man is only organized matter, there is 
no free-will in man.’ But Lucretius said there is liberty 
of action in man, ‘ by means of which we go whereso- 
ever inclination leads each of us.’ ‘ Wherefore,’ said 
he, ‘ you must necessarily confess that the same is 
the case in the seeds of matter . . . since we see that 
nothing can be produced from nothing.’ To most im- 
partial judges it will appear, that if either process be 
more valid than the other, that of Lucretius is to be 
preferred. He at any rate began by admitting the best 
known facts in the universe, viz., those of our own con- 
sciousness, and thence reasoned up to the properties 
of things beyond observation. Modern Materialists 
begin with things we do not know, and thence proceed 
to deny our knowledge of ourselves. It is also in- 
structive to observe that, unlike many moderns, he 
saw and stated in this connection the absurdity of sup- 


16 The Mystery of God. 


posing that cause could follow cause in infinite succes- 
sion. 

It would far exceed the limits of this discussion to 
describe the manner in which Lucretius traced out the 
development of the present system of nature from his 
free-will atoms. His book is well worth reading, as a 
work of the imagination, and also as containing some- 
thing more than the germ of modern physical theories. 
In his observations upon the fear of death there are 
thoughts which no man need be ashamed to ponder, 
and by which many who have a little faith might be 
rebuked. It is impossible for any generous heart not 
to feel a strong measure of sympathy with this bold, 
cledr thinker, who followed the light of reason wher- 
ever its pale taper led. It is only just to remember the 
debasing and fear-gendering superstitions which pre- 
vailed over the Roman world in his day; how glimmer- 
ing and uncertain was the light shed on the Being of 
God by such men as Socrates and Plato; and the repul- 
siveness and arrogance of spirit which characterized the 
Jewish people, who-alone inherited the sublime creed 
of Abraham. - No one who considers the surroundings 
and opportunities of Lucretius will judge him as if he 
had rejected such light as now shines from the teach- 
ings of Christianity. Lucretius had never heard the 
words which tell of God as a Spirit and the Father of 
our spirits, when he declared that atoms and void space 
are the only things which exist. If, therefore, as Paul, 
standing on Mars Hill, declared, God overlooked the 
idolatry which men practised in ‘times of ignorance,’ 
He could not be less merciful to one who despised 


Materialism. te 


idolatry, yet found not Him ‘in whom we live and 
move and have our being.’ 

For centuries the atomic theory passed out of sight. 
The conflict between pagan superstition and pagan 
scepticism gave place to a mightier battle, in which 
Christianity assailed and grappled with them both. 
Christian thinkers were able to ally their beliefs with 
the idealism of Plato, and afterwards to employ the 
logical method of Aristotle; but Materialism and 
Christianity could not live together for an hour. 
Through the middle ages there was but little fruitful 
thinking. Philosophy and religion alike sank very low. 
The dominant Church, departing from the spirit and 
maxims of its founders, overlaid the ancient simplicity 
of apostolic teachings and practice with semi-pagan 
customs and immoralities. The very Popes and 
Cardinals became undisguised infidels, and a practical 
Materialism of the basest sort prevailed. The revolt 
of the nations from Rome released the minds and 
tongues of many, and unbelief as well as faith became 
articulate. Still, the atomic theory of Lucretius found 
no revival until the days of Gassendi and Hobbes, and 
by them it was only held in a very modified fashion. 
To call Hobbes a Materialist would be unfair, but his 
writings unquestionably provided a philosophic weapon 
for the hands of many who went beyond him after- 
wards. On the eve of the French Revolution Ma- 
terialism burst into power. Voltaire and Rousseau were 
not, as is vulgarly supposed, Materialists; but others 
whose names need not detain us proclaimed, ‘ There 
is no God in heaven, no soul in man’s body, no future 
existence.’ Strange to say, while shrieking ‘ Liberty’ 

2 


18 . The Mystery of God. 


as the first word of their revolutionary cry, these red 
philosophers declared, ‘There is no free-will.’ All 
readers of history know what terrible licentiousness 
revelled under the name of Liberty, while defying 
judgment under the plea of Necessity; what envy 
and covetousness brought derision on the demand for 
Equality, and what fiendish brutality mocked the asser- 
tion of Fraternity. To complete the paradox, it only 
needed that Madness should crown itself as Wisdom, 
and this, through the inspiration of Materialism, was 
also done in the face of mankind. Vile women, flushed 
with wine and passion, sat enthroned in the churches 
of France to receive worship as the true symbols of 
the goddess Reason, vice the God of Christianity de- 
posed. Under the reign of sucha deity, the worshippers 
became like unto the object of their devotion, and all 
the sanctities of home and family were set at nought. 
The chief effect of these excesses was to produce a 
shuddering recoil from Materialistic principles, and 
they found little philosophic expression in the gene- 
ration which ensued. But within the last half-century 
advocates have sprung up throughout Europe who 
have succeeded in forcing their views into a {front 
place. H.G. Atkinson and his distinguished disciple, 
Harriet Martineau, led the van of modern English 
Materialism ; and in their writings the system is boldly 
enunciated, and its theological and ethical issues are 
fearlessly discussed. Historically, it would be proper 
to consider their doctrines in this place; but it will be 
preferable to postpone their notice, because the funda- 
mental principles they espoused cannot be satisfactorily 
discussed apart from more recent speculations, and 


Materialism. d 19 
eo ee 

also because it is advisable to keep the moral tendencies 
of Materialism separate from its abstract truth or 
falsity. We have now, therefore, to consider the 
manner in which contemporary writers endeavour to 
supply the defects and to rectify the errors which were 
confessedly fatal to the atomic theory as propounded 
by Lucretius. | 

We have seen how his idea of atoms falling through 
space, whether in a straight or slanting direction, 
appears absurd in the light of modern physics. No 
scientific mind can endure the notion of invisible 
particles behaving in a way which would be unlawful 
for those that are visible. Neither can a sober philo- 
sopher impute free-will to these atoms, while regarding 
them as the materials of the universe, in which law 
reigns without variableness. How, then, are we now 
invited to regard these atoms as coming together and 
combining to form the things we see ? 

Allowing the existence of atoms to be assumed for 
the sake of argument, and also that they are the 
ultimate forms of matter, it will be found that the 
newest theory of motion amongst them involves quite 
as much absurdity as that of Democritus or of 
Lucretius. The law of gravitation, which upsets these 
ancient assertions, is now relied upon to explain the 
mystery in another fashion. This law, as now estab- 
lished, is, ‘that every body attracts every other body 
with a force proportional to their masses conjointly, 
and to the square of their distances inversely.’ Every 
atom, therefore, it is reasoned, must be regarded asa 
centre of gravity; hence atoms would come together 
of themselves. 


eae 


20 The Mystery of God. 


This is, no doubt, as obvious to some minds as the 
free volitional action of atoms was to Lucretius, but 
it is scarcely more satisfactory. If the atoms were 
originally of equal size and equally distributed through 
space, they would be equally attracted on every side, 
and so would remain still for ever unless moved by 
some external force. But the theory before us finds 
force only in the atoms, and therefore has no external 
source of motion to suggest. Shall we be asked to 
believe, then, that these atoms are of different S1Zes, 
or unequally distributed in space? If so, we require 
to be informed how these phenomena were produced. 
If matter be a single substance, as the theory itself 
insists, its divisibility must be uniform; and if these 
atoms are, as alleged, the smallest pieces into which 
matter can be divided, they must all be of the same 
size. If it could’be proved that they vary in size and 
shape, it would be evidence that theycare sas ah. 
Maxwell said, ‘ manufactured articles,’ and the atomic 
theory is gone. The only remaining hypothesis is that, 
being equal in size, they were never equally distributed. 
But then we inquire, what caused the inequality ? 
Clearly not the force of gravity, for that could only 
get to work among equal masses as the result of their 
unequal distances, and cannot be thought of as the 
cause of its own antecedent conditions. Therefore, 
according to the modern theory, we are still asked to 
believe that invisible atoms conduct themselves when 
out of human sight ina manner of which no visible body 
is capable; or else we must accept the absurdity, from 
which even Lucretius shrank, of an infinite succession 
of finite causes, cause following cause for ever, 


Materialism. 21 


These considerations alone, when duly apprehended, 
are absolutely fatal to the atomic theory as an attempt 
to account for the universe. But for the sake of clear- 
ness it may be desirable to present the same thought in- 
a different form. 

Recent discussions have necessitated a distinction 
between Force and Energy.* The two terms may 
appear to many quite synonymous. There are, how- 
ever, two distinct ideas which need naming apart, and 
these terms are now devoted to this purpose in scientific 
terminology. Energy signifies the power of doing 
work, in whatever that power may consist. Force is 
strictly only a name for the rate at which some agent 
possessed of energy does work. It is, as Professor Tait 
puts it, no morea real entity than the bank rate oi 
interest is actual money. If bodies move towards 
one another, it is because some energy is at work to 
set them moving, and force is the rate at which they 
work. The question we are considering, then, must 
be put anew in this form: ‘ What is the energy which 
moves all bodies in the manner stated by the law 
of gravity?’ Is it resident in the atoms, or is it 
external to them? If it be not inthem, the Materialist 


* For a lucid exposition of the subject the reader is advised to 
consult Professor Tait’s ‘Recent Advances in Physical Science,’ 
p. 338. Mr. Herbert Spencer, whose use of the word ‘Force’ 
Professor Tait criticises, has commented on the criticism in an 
appendix to the fourth edition of his ‘ First Principles,’ but he has 
not answered the argument. Mr. Spencer will also be quoted to 
show that, whether we agree with him or with Professor Tait, we 
are inevitably brought to the same conclusion, viz., that the energy 
or force known to us in nature is not the power which originates 
motion or which can be thought of as persistent. 


22 The Mystery of God. 


has nowhere else to look, for it cannot be in empty 
“space... Jf it be: in them, it must be-either actual 
(kinetic) or potential, and in order to answer our 
question we must remember the difference between 
these two things. Potential energy, as its name de- 
notes, never originates motion in any body. There 
is potential energy in a stone carried up to the top of a 
house and laid on the edge of the roof. But that stone 
will never stir unless moved. Push it over, and its 
potential energy will become actual, and in falling 
down it will have a force which can be measured by 
mathematical instruments to a nicety, and may be 
roughly estimated by any passer-by on whose head it 
falls. Potential energy is not the property of any body 
as such, but is always due to some position in which 
it has been placed by work done. The only difference 
between a stone on a housetop which possesses potential 
energy, and a stone on the pavement which does not, 
is due to its position, and that position is due to the 
antecedent fact that you have expended energy by 
carrying it up against gravity, and that work is not lost, 
but is stored: up for future use. A push given to a 
stone on the pavement moves it a few inches, and with 
scarcely any force. A similar push administered to the 
same stone when carried up to the roof will send it 
down with immense force to do good or evil work 
below. Clearly, then, potential energy never originated 
motion, and can never exist except as the result of pre- 
vious movement. If, therefore, any energy be pos- 
sessed by atoms as such, it must be actual energy. 
But here, again, physical science declares the thing im- 
possible. Such a thing as actual energy apart from 


Materialism. 23 


some previous work done is unknown and unthinkable. 
The first law of motion is that ‘ Every body continues 
in its state of rest or of uniform motion in a straight 
line, except in so far as it is compelled by forces to 
change that state ;’ 7.e., no visible body moves without 
being moved. Matter cannot start itself, nor, if started, 
can it stop itself, or turn itself aside. Clearly, then, 
energy is not a property of matter as such, and cannot 
be attributed to the primal atoms without an error as 
gross as that of the ancient speculators. To say that 
atoms originally came together because they are 
centres of gravity is still to say that they behaved in 
far-off eternities as matter never does when the moni- 
torial eye of science is upon its movements. The 
future poet of this theory will, however, have a fine field 
for his imagination, and will be able to clothe the hard 
doctrine with romantic beauty by tracing the paternity 
of all that is to the illicit love of two attractive atoms 
which unlawfully came together. From this secret sin 
of unwatched and ungovernable mites the world, with 
all its marvels of order and all its joys and sorrows, 
has proceeded. This was the true origin of evil, and 
because matter is eternal there must be hidden some- 
where in the universe the first guilty pair, and as every 
atom must possess a portion of ‘ mind-stuff,’ it is to be 
hoped they have long since repented of their transgres- 
sion! Probably every devout Pessimist will pray that 
when this feverish concourse and commotion they have 
caused has sunk to rest, they may ‘ never do so again.’ 

This may justly be called nonsense, but it is none the 
less a fair mythical presentation of the current theory of 
Materialism. It is a theory which, though seriously 


24 09 The Mystery of God. 
See 
propounded by men of scientific professions, makes a 


, jest of gravity, and is well fitted in another sense to 


disturb the gravity of the world. The energy known 
to science never could have originated motion; and if 
the present laws of nature continue, all the energy 
that is now active must of necessity sink down into a 
potential state, and so the entire universe of matter fall 
into a state of everlasting rest. Should it ever so come 
to pass, all the energy which will remain in store will be 
powerless to arouse itself and do any work. There 1S, 
therefore, no way of accounting for a first motion, and 
no hope of perpetuity for the existing order of nature, 
apart from a self-sufficient and originative Power, un- 
discoverable by physical methods, but which, whether 
Knowable or Unknowable by other means, is a necessity 
of thought. 

Whatever errors Mr. Herbert Spencer may have fallen 
into, whether in the judgment of science or theology, 
he has clearly seen and proclaimed this fact ;/morican 
this stage of our argument be more fitly concluded than 
in his words: ‘ The force of which we assert persistence 
is that Absolute Force of which we are indefinitely con- 
Scious as the necessary correlate of the force we know. 
By the Persistence of Force, we really mean the persist- 
ence of some Cause which transcends our knowledge 
and conception. In asserting it, we assert an Uncon- 
ditioned Reality, without beginning or end.’* ‘The 


- consciousness of an Inscrutable Power manifested to 


us through all phenomena has been growing ever 
clearer, and must eventually be freed from its imper- 
fections. The certainty that on the one hand such a 


“ “First Principles,’ p. 192 d (fourth edition). 


Materralisne. war ae a 


A ee 


Power exists, while on the other hand its nature tran- 
scends intuition and is beyond imagination, is the cer- 
tainty towards which all intelligence has from the first 
been progressing. To this conclusion Science inevitably 
arrives as it reaches its confines; while to this conclusion 
Religion is irresistibly driven by criticism. And, satis- 
fying as it does the demands of the most rigorous logic, | 
at the same time that it gives the religious sentiment 
the widest possible sphere of action, it is the conclusion 
we are bound to accept without reserve or qualifica- 
tion.’* 

It need scarcely be explained that this passage may 
be cordially approved without accepting Mr. Spencer’s 
views concerning the ‘Great Unknowable.’ In so far 
as these are of a negative character and preclusive of 
all hope of intercourse between the First Cause and 
man, it will be necessary elsewhere to subject them to 
criticism. Our argument at present simply goes to 
show that Materialism breaks down utterly as an 
attempt to explain the existing order of nature. Here, 
then, the whole subject might be dismissed, for if a 
theory is unable to account for molecular motion, it can 
account for nothing in this moving universe of things. 
When it falls back on some mysterious but eternal 
Power which Science cannot know, yet knows must be, 
Materialism is gone, and the field is clear for Philosophy 
and Religion to consider what may be known or reason- 
ably believed of this Power, and what our attitude of 
mind should be in the presence of this Infinite Reality. 
It will, however, be desirable to consider here what 


* *First Principles,’ p. 108. 


26 The Mystery of God. 


Materialism has to tell us concerning Life, and finally 
to add a few words about its relation to Morality. 

It is impossible to discuss the origin of Life without 
dealing with the often battered words of Professors 
Tyndall and Huxley. Neither of these gentlemen is a 
professed Materialist, and it would be wrong to fasten 
upon them any name or opinions they repudiate. It 
would be idle, however, to ignore the fact that they 
have stated the Materialistic argument more power- 
fully and popularly than any other writers of our time. 
They are nevertheless entitled to receive fullest credit 
for the reservations they have made. It does not appear 
either wise or generous to pin them to conclusions which 
plainly are not satisfactory to their own minds. The 
next few paragraphs are not written to controvert any 
of their statements or arguments. On the contrary, 
we need ask no more convincing witnesses that matter, 
as at present known to science (if indeed it be known), 
does not contain life in itself, nor even ‘ the promise and 
potency of life.’ 

When Professor Tyndall said at Belfast that he dis- 
cerned in matter such ‘promise and potency,’ he 
expressly declared that this was not a scientific percep- 
tion. Inthe same sentence he candidly avowed that 
in order to discern this wondrous virtue in matter, he 
is compelled to ‘cross the boundary of experimental 
evidence.’ His next paragraph opens thus: ‘ If youask 
me whether there exists the least evidence to prove that 
any form of life can be developed out of matter without 
demonstrable antecedent life, my reply is, that evidence 
considered perfectly conclusive by many has been ad- 
duced.’ But then he proceeds to indicate that in spite 


a en ee ee ON ee 


Peet 


id ra eS, 


Sep er ee 


Materialism. 27 


of a strong desire to find a confirmation of his specula- 
tive belief, he, in common with other scientific observers, 
rejects this evidence as ‘ vitiated by error.’ His final 
answer to the question quoted above is that these — 
inquirers after truth, himself included, do ‘ frankly 
admit their inability to point to any satisfactory experi- 
mental proof that life can be developed save from 
demonstrable antecedent life.’ Professor Huxley’s 
evidence is to the same effect. Ina celebrated article, 
he says, ‘If the hypothesis of evolution be true, 
living matter must have arisen from not-living matter.:* 
He does not conceal his wish to establish this hypo- 
thesis, and sometimes seems to speak as if it were 
already proved, but in the same article he confesses : 
‘ There is not a shadow of trustworthy direct evidence 
that abiogenesis does take place within the period dur- 
ing which the existence of life on the globe is recorded.’ 
While the prophets of physical science deliver them- 
selves of such statements as these, the notion of life 
arising out of not-living matter must be regarded as a 
defunct theory, or more truly as a theory of life which 
has come into the world still-born. Science is ac- 
quainted with a time when life did not exist upon this 
globe, and could not possibly have existed. The period 
when it first appeared, lies not in a vague unknowable 
eternity, but within ages which can be estimated if not 
certainly computed; yet with the most eager desire to 
find the point of transition from lifelessness to life, 
seekers return baffled by the contradictions of nature 
to their hypothesis. Spontaneous generation is as 


‘Encyclo. Brit.,’ ninth edition ; article, ‘ Biology.” 


28 Lhe Mystery of God. 


much a dream as the elixir of life and the philosopher’s 
stone. 

This reference to Messrs. Huxley and Tyndall must 
not close without recognising the candour of the ad- 
missions quoted from their writings. It would be 
pleasant to think that they always wrote and spoke 
with the diffidence that such immeasurable gaps in their 
system might suggest, and many who admire their 
scientific expositions would gladly trace somewhat more 
of reluctance in their insistence on what is confessedly 
only a theory, and in disparagement of a faith which 
to millions is precious beyond price. Though not 
Materialists, they have probably done more than any 
men now living to make Materialists, and to disturb 
faith in Him whois a Spirit. Comparatively few observe 
the force of those occasional sentences which leave open 
their own retreat into Pantheism, if not into Theism. 
Fewer still read, or lay to heart, the words which have 
now and then exhibited their scorn of thorough-going 
Materialism, and at any rate, on the part of Professor 
Tyndall, the weary longing of his spirit for some ‘ Rock 
that is higher than’ we. While expressing these 
regrets, and profoundly impressed as to the immense 
responsibility which rests on these teachers for the 
undermining of faitn in our generation, a Christian may 
well feel some shame on account of the manner in 
which they have been treated by numerous theologians, 
and by many more who are not theologians, but have 
taken upon them to speak bitterly for God. If Christian 
faith be valid, the hand of One who healed the wound 
made by an angry disciple in the garden of Gethsemane 
is always busy repairing the injuries wrought by ignor- 


Materialesne. 29 


ant zeal in His name, and a vast majority of Christians 
in our day would pray to have it so. How much Pro- 
fessor Tyndall has suffered under the treatment he has 
occasionally received, and yet how miserably Material- 
ism or any other godless theory fails to appease his 
nature, will be seen in these words, which no right- 
souled man can read without respectful sympathy: 
‘When standing in the spring time and looking upon 
the sprouting foliage, the lilies of the field, and sharing 
the general joy of opening life, I have often asked 
myself whether there is no power, being, or thing, in 
the universe, whose knowledge of that of which I am 
so ignorant is greater than mine. I have said to myself, 
Can it be possible that man’s knowledge is the greatest 
knowledge, that man’s life is the highest life? My 
friends, the profession of that Atheism with which I 
am sometimes so lightly charged would, in my case, be 
an impossible answer to this question: only slightly 
preferable to that fierce and distorted Theism which 
I have lately had reason to know still reigns rampant 
in some minds, as the survival of a more ferocious 
age. * 

‘In connection with the charge of Atheism, I would 
make one remark. Christian men are proved by their 
writings to have their hours of weakness and of doubt, 
as well as their hours of strength and conviction; and 
men like myself share, in their own way, these varia- 
tions of mood and tense. Were the religious views of 
many of my assailants the only alternative ones, I do 
not know how strong the claims of the doctrine of 


* Lecture on ‘Crystals and Molecular Force,’ appended to the 
Belfast Address, pp. 81, 82. Delivered October, 1874. 


30 Lhe Mystery of God. 


‘Material Atheism’? upon my allegiance might be. 
Probably they would be very strong. But as it is, I 
have noticed during years of self-observation that it is 
not in hours of clearness and vigour that this doctrine 
commends itself to my mind; that in the hours of 
stronger and healthier thought it ever dissolves and 
disappears, as offering no solution of the mystery in 
which we dwell and of which we form a part.’* 


In the historical review of Materialism, the immoral 
tendencies of the system were of necessity alluded to; 
but in discussing the theory these tendencies have not 
been relied upon to prove it false. There are many 
who would rather trust the dictates of their moral 
nature than the conclusions of their reason, and a great 
deal might be said in their favour. It has seemed 
preferable to keep the abstract question, as far as 
possible, separate from practical tendencies; but it 
must not be overlooked that the theory which on purely 
evidential grounds has been found baseless, would, if 
established, provide no basis for any sort of morality. 
This has often been strenuously denied, but it has also 
been sorrowfully admitted by some of its advocates, 
and scornfully exulted in by others. That there may 
be and are Materialists of exemplary character may be 
cheerfully admitted. But it would be dangerous work 
for them to challenge attention as representatives of 
their theory. The moral tastes and habits of men are 
governed far more by the quality of their early training 
than by the theories—especially scientific theories— 
adopted in later life. Those, moreover, who live in a 


* Belfast Address,’ Preface to fifth thousand, p. 36. 


Materialism, aI 


social atmosphere, and under pressure of opinions, 
formed by centuries of Christian influence, are not to 
be regarded as samples of the manhood Materialism 
would produce if it prevailed in a nation for two or 
three generations. When an Englishman migrates to 
a sultry and insalubrious climate, he carries with him. 
an amount of physical energy which surprises the 
natives. But, staying there and rearing up a family, he 
has the pain of seeing his children conforming to the 
native type, and a third generation will have but little 
to boast of in the way of British vigour. It will be 
wiser, then, and more satisfactory to all parties, to leave 
personal characters undiscussed, except where history 
may permit a fair induction of facts. 

What have Materialists who have spoken out most 
plainly said upon the question of morality? H. G. 
Atkinson wrote: ‘ Knowledge . . sees good in evil and 
the working of general laws for the general good, and 
sees no more sin in a crooked disposition than in a 
crooked stick in the water; or in a hump back or a 
squint.’* Harriet Martineau, who accepted all At- 
kinson’s teachings, observed: ‘ When we have finally 
dismissed all notion of subjection to a superior law- 
less Will, all the perplexing notions of sin and respon- 
sibility . . . . the relief is like that of coming out of 
a cave full of painted shadows under the free sky, 
with the earth open round about us to the horizon’ 
(p. 219). 

These are not isolated personal opinions, uncon- 
nected with a Materialistic theory of nature, but are 


* €Letters on the Laws of Man’s Nature and Development,’ 
By H. G. Atkinson and H. Martineau, p. 141. 


Be The Mystery of God. 


the irresistible conclusions to which it conducts. That 
. theory affirms, in Atkinson’s words, ‘that instinct, 
passion, thought, are effects of organized substance’ 
(p. 6). ‘Mind is the consequence of the material man, 
its existence depending on the action of the brain’ 
(p. 16). ‘For every effect there is a sufficient cause: 
and all causes are material causes influenced by sur- 
rounding circumstances; which is nothing more than 
matter being influenced by matter.’ ‘Some men are 
wolves by their nature and some are lambs; and it 
is vain to talk of responsibility’ (p. 132). ‘I am as 
completely the result of my nature, and impelled to do 
what I do, as the needle to point to the north, or the 
puppet to move according as the string is pulled’ 
(p. 132). ‘No man can make himself what he is not 
any more than an eel could become a horse, or Lord 
Brougham turn into a grasshopper’ (p. 133). Ob- 
viously, then, both stick and temper become crooked 
by the unavoidable action of molecular changes. Why, 
then, should the temper be blamed and the stick not? 
What moral quality is there in either? There is no 
Materialist, however delicate in virtue and upright in 
life, who can evade the inexorable logic of this argu- 
ment, as stated without compunction by Voght: ‘It is 
indeed true, free-will does not exist, neither does any 
amenability or responsibility, such as morals and penal 
justice, and heaven knows what else, would impose 
upon us. At no moment are we our own masters, 
any more than we can decree as to the secretions of 
our kidneys. The organism cannot govern itself; it is 
governed by the law of its material combination. It is 
impossible to demonstrate the admissibility of punish- 


Materialism. 33 


ment, or to prove that there is any such thing as amen- 
ability or responsibility.’ It needs no argument to show 
that a system of thought, which logically issues in such 
conclusions, is fatal to all ethics, and must in the long 
run prove fatal to civil government as well as to private 
virtue. There is no room for the word ‘ought’ in a 
Materialist’s vocabulary. Our moral scruples are to 
him an illusion from which it is the path of peace and 
pleasantness to hasten his escape. Authority, divine 
or human, becomes the most hateful anomaly in his 
eyes. ‘Hatred of God is the beginning of wisdom,’ 
affirmed one. ‘Our enemy is God,’ shrieked another. 
If any Materialist draws back with loathing from these 
revolting utterances, he is no doubt a better man, but 
at the same time he is a worse logician. Happily there 
are inconsistent Materialists, as unhappily there are 
inconsistent Christians ; but the moral value of the two 
systems may be summed up in a single sentence: The 
more inconsistent a Materialist is, the better he be- 
comes as a man, a citizen, and a friend; but the more 
inconsistent a Christian is, the worse he becomes as a 
man, and in all the relationships of life. 

Such considerations as these are of no mean value. 
They are a sort of reductio ad horrendum, warning us to 
think carefully and examine well every premise and 
every term of the syllogism. At the same time, they 
would not suffice to alter a single demonstrated fact, or 
to invalidate a fully verified conclusion. If all that we 
hold dear in virtue, and beautiful in holiness, be without 
any basis in reason, and if there be no such thing as 
moral obligation, then we must let our fair ideals go, or 
at any rate hold them merely as preferential thoughts. 


3 


34 The Mystery of God. 


There is, however, no occasion for this sacrifice of all 
that renders life worth living. Materialism fails to 
account for the facts of either motion or life, and the 
world may await with calmness the supply of these 
fundamental defects. Should they ever be supplied, 
there are many things to be said which the present 
limits of knowledge render superfluous. Many earnest 
thinkers anticipate an eventual formation of a complete 
and unbroken theory of Evolution. When that happens, 
it needs no prophet to predict that it will not be stated, 
or utterable in the terms of matter, nor exclude the 
operations of the Divine or the human will. 

With such facts and arguments and admissions 
before our minds, it would be idle to discuss the higher 
stages of evolution as if the truth of Materialism de- 
pended upon them. Against the theory of evolution 
as representing an order of progress, no Christian need 
have a word to utter; but on the other hand, as a 
theory of origins, it has not a word to say for itself. 
It cannot account for motion, and it cannot account 
for life, and it cannot tell you what is the real substance 
or the primary form of matter, or even prove against 
an Idealist that matter itself exists. Materialism as 
an explanation of the universe is like a theory of archi- 
tecture which can tell you everything about a house 
except who built it, what it is made of, and whether 
the whole structure may not be a phantom of your 
own brain. In exposing the emptiness of such a theory, 
it may appear to some that very little has been accom- 
plished. In truth, however, a clear and definite con- 
viction that physical science has not explained, and 
cannot hope to explain, the universe, is just what 


Materialism. 35 


re) 


thousands of educated and uneducated people in our 
day lack. There is an undefined notion, widely spread, 
that a Great First Cause is a sort of extra belief which 
science is able to dispense with. Hearts which throb © 
in sympathy with the prayers and songs of ancient 
Prophets and Apostles are tortured by insinuations 
which are freely made that they are clinging for com- 
fort’s sake to a faith which has no foundation in reason, 
and is not in harmony with the verified knowledge of 
our age. Let them once see that the intellect as well 
as the heart demands, as Mr. Herbert Spencer says, a 
“Cause which transcends our knowledge,’ and that in 
this ultimate truth ‘ Religion and Science coalesce,’ 
and then, released from the haunting dread of being 
‘too superstitious,’ they will entertain whatever beliefs 
may appear most reasonable concerning the nature, 
character, and manward relations of this Great Power. 
It is not assumed because Materialism fails to establish 
its fundamental propositions that therefore the Chris- 
tian ideas of God are entitled to our credence. The 
position regarded as established in this chapter is, that 
the contradictions of Materialism are not founded on 
a knowledge of facts incompatible with the first prin- 
ciples of Christianity. All that we know of the material 
universe is consistent with the statement, ‘ By faith we 
understand that the worlds have been framed by the 
word of God, so that what is seen hath not been made 
out of things which do appear;’ and also with the 
teaching of Christ, that He who made the heavens 
and the earth is the Father of a spiritual nature in 
man, and has been pleased to afford us some know- 
ledge of Himself. | 


fe ecaa 


OHAPTE RAT: 
PANTHEISM. 


PANTHEISM, as the word itself imports, is a theory of 
the universe which regards the whole of it as God. 
We look out upon an innumerable multitude of objects, 
celestial and terrestrial, which appear to be undergoing 
a ceaseless process of movement and change; but 
behind all differences and alterations our minds inquire 
after some wondrous unity. Our thoughts cannot rest 
inthe many. The Materialist says ‘ All these pheno- 
mena are the outcome of one substance called Matter,’ 
and searches after unity by reducing the universe to an 
infinite number of atoms. The Pantheist says, ‘ All 
these phenomena are simply aspects or modifications 
of one substance, which is God. God is the Infinite 
All, and outside the all nothing can be; therefore, all 
that is is God.’ Some Pantheists say matter does not 
exist except as an idea of our minds. Others say the 
material universe is God’s body—the Infinite Soul 
dwells in the visible system of Nature as man’s soul 
dwells in his body. A very fascinating notion this, and 
one of which many are rather enamoured who have 
never looked critically into the philosophy of Pantheism. 
They suppose it to mean that God is a conscious, 
thinking, and controlling Spirit, superior to all things, 


Panthetsut. a7 


and impelling and guiding them by His power. But 
this is not what the Pantheist means. His cardinal 
doctrine is that God has no existence except in the 
system of Nature, and therefore He is not conscious, 
except and in so far as we and other conscious beings 
are parts of God. The analogy of soul and body, then, 
which some Pantheists employ, must not delude us 
into a false definition of our subject. Whether matter 
be admitted or denied, Pantheism asserts that every- 
thing and all things are God, and God has no existence 
above or independent of what a Christian calls the 
creation. Isaiah places in the mouth of the Creator of 
the heaven and earth the words, ‘I am the Lord, and 
there is none else; there is no God beside Me... .’ 
But Pantheism makes the universe say, ‘I am God, 
and there is nothing else beside me.’ 

This fundamental position needs to be carefully 
remembered, for without it there can be no clear 
thought on the subject. It is one of the most marked 
features of popular Pantheistic literature that it freely 
ascribes the qualities we associate with personality to 
what it calls God. It speaks of the All as full of love, 
wisdom, goodness, and other attributes of conscious 
beings. But let no one be deceived. This is not 
Pantheism in its philosophic mantle, talking to students 
in the porch; it is Pantheism with a shepherd’s reed 
and a garland of laurels, reclining in green pastures 
and pouring out the poetry of its feelings untrammelled 
by critical severities of speech. 

Adopting, as with Materialism, the historic method, 
we may wisely gather our knowledge of the theory, 
and form our estimate of its value, by reviewing its 


38 The Mystery of God 


various expressions and results through the course of 
- ages. 

Untilrecent years the Hindoos were looked down upon 
by Europe as a race of senseless idolaters. It is now 
well known that the gross idolatry which prevails 
throughout India is in some way connected with subtle 
and most ancient systems of philosophy, and with an 
extensive literature in languages long since passed out 
of use. Our knowledge of this literature is chiefly due 
to the labours cf Christian scholars, though partly to 
a revived interest in their own sacred books which 
the invasion of a new religion has stirred up among 
natives of the learned caste. This knowledge, how- 
ever, is still very imperfect, and in dealing with Indian 
religious thought, the inquirer has continually to deplore - 
the lack of clear historic and biographic details such 
as are available in the study of Grecian philosophy. 

It is believed by many that a pure Monotheism was 
the primitive creed of India. Without expressing an 
opinion on that point, we may start our review with 
the religious condition exhibited in some of the older 
Vedic hymns. This appears to be a very simple 
worship of natural objects, such as the bright sky, the 
sun and stars, the dawn of day, clouds, rivers, trees, 
and indeed all the varied forms of external nature. 
These objects became gradually associated in poetry 
and popular belief with personalities mystically con- 
nected with them, just as the same process can be 
traced in Greece and even among the Hebrews. This 
veneration easily led to image-worship, and as the 
feeling of awe is in human nature always blended with 
feelings of guilt and fear, sacrificial rites and cruel 


Pantheism. 39 


customs inevitably arose. Polytheism, the worship oi 
‘the many’ as gods, never did and never could satisfy 
earnest and profound thinkers. Such men incessantly 
asked, ‘How came these many gods into being?’ 
‘What relation do they bear to one another, and to the 
world, past, present, and future ?’ 

Groping for a common cause and a bond of unity, 
these early thinkers conceived that behind the many 
gods there must be One, and by abstract reasonings 
they concluded that this One Being must be the sub- 
stance of all that is. Then came this metaphysical 
puzzle: If an Infinite Being exists, how can anything 
else exist? ‘Something else’ means something more, 
but there cannot be more than what is infinite; ergo, 
there is only One Being. We cannot be surprised at 
this confusion of mind, for similar feats of reasoning 
have been common, and are not unknown in modern 
England. The puzzle is really a verbal one. There 
may be many infinities of various kinds, none displacing 
the others. Infinite time may co-exist with infinite 
space. Mind, as conceived by most English thinkers, 
does not displace matter in space. Infinite love does 
not exclude infinite wisdom, nor does power exclude 
goodness. Again, infinite substance may have many 
attributes, and possess them without limitation of 
degree. Those attributes may surely include power to 
create worlds, which, because created, are not necessary 
or self-existent, and might pass away and leave their 
maker undiminished. Those attributes may also 
include power to call into existence many conscious 
beings capable of education and discipline. In fact, to 
say there is an Infinite Being, but to deny it these 


40 Lhe Mystery of God. 


powers, is to utter a contradiction; it is to imagine 
what is finite and call it infinite. Having the sublime 
Biblical idea of God in mind, we can probably see this 
without much difficulty; but these ancient Hindoo 
sages were unable by wisdom to find out God, and 
they declared with confidence, ‘ All that is is one,’ and 
called this one Brahma. 

But having found their Brahma, their Pan, their 
absolute Being, what was to be done with the many? 
Not a few philosophers have disposed of an external 
world to their own relief by declaring it only a vision 
of the mind, and without objective existence. But this 
leaves the thinker free to regard himself as real, and to 
say, ‘I think; thereforeI am.’ But such half-measures 
did not satisfy the ‘intellectual seriousness’ of these 
Hindoos. Ifa single man could say, ‘I am, but all 
outside me is ideal, a mere phantasm of my own mind,’ 
that man must either be Brahma, or something more 
than Brahma. But he could not be Brahma, for per- 
fect being can have no illusions. Therefore, either 
Brahma must be denied, or the thinker must deny him- 
self. Their great difficulty lay in the fact of man’s 
self-consciousness. Each man looked out on the uni- 
verse and divided it into two parts, the ‘I’ and the 
‘not I.’ This, of course, is what we all do. It is not 
vanity or folly which cuts up everything into two such 
unequal parts; it is a necessity of thought. The thinker 
knows himself, or thinks that he does, and views all 
other things and beings as objects outside. What then 
could be done with this stubborn difficulty of countless 
beings, each conscious of a separate existence? They 
dealt with it ina most drastic manner. The universe 


Panthersnt. At 


was purged of all but Brahma in a sentence, ‘It is all 

maya ’—z1z.e., illusion. Consciousness is an illusion, and 

it is the illusory cause of that huge illusion called the 

world. Brahma is not conscious of himself—does not. 
know himself as we seem to know ourselves. Nor 
does he know anything outside himself, for there is 

nothing outside but illusion. He has no qualities, and 

no attributes, and can cause nothing, for nothing but 

Brahma is. The ripe result of Hindoo wisdom, there- 

fore, was and is, ‘No thing is but Nothing.’ We are 

but dreams of dreaming which no real person dreams. 

We are nothing, and the sooner we cease to have the 

horrible feeling of being something the better. The 

sooner the illusion fades and we sink back into Brahma 

or the eternal peace of Nothingness, the sooner we shall 

escape the tormenting deceit called Life. 

Then why did they not commit suicide? That is 
precisely what they were anxious to do. Annihilation 
is not to the philosophic Hindoo a penal substitute for 
hell; it is his heaven, and the object of all his aspira- 
tion. But then the sages of old were wise enough to 
confess suicide a very difficult thing. It may be easy 
for an illusion called a man to put an imaginary knife 
into his imaginary body; but what would be the good of 
that if it only changed the dream and he began to think 
himself a tiger, a serpent, or a snail? This was the 
philosophic view of transmigration. They believed 
that men had passed through countless cycles of 
illusory existence, and that death, except to the pre- 
pared, would only fling them into a repetition of the 
most horrible and prolonged experiences. It was this 
which gave eternal Nothingness its charm. It was 


42 The Mystery of God. 


regarded as the sole escape from otherwise endless 
_dreams of filthy and miserable animal consciousness. 
Only from the human stage of illusion could escape 
be found into repose. Suicide, therefore, to the Hindoo, 
took the form of subjecting self to a course of mortifi- 
cation and solitary meditation. To attain absorption 
into Brahma, the mind must withdraw itself from all 
interest in so-called outward things. All ordinary 
desires must be quenched, all seeming existences must 
be contemplated as vanities and lies. Thought must 
become concentrated upon Brahma, and then in the 
course of ages of ever deepening repose, conscious- 
ness of self will fade away into the perfect peace of 
the only true Being, which is Brahma, or absolute 
Nothing. 

This philosophic Pantheism was the seed of Bud- 
dhism, but the soil in which the new religion took root 
and flourished was that of a gross Polytheism. Sucha 
frosty creed as Brahmanism had no charm for the 
multitude, and never did or could become popular. 
The origination of Buddhism is ascribed to an Indian 
prince named'Gotama. His life story is almost entirely 
mythical. The time when he lived is uncertain, the 
earliest date assigned for his birth being 620 B.c., and 
the latest for his death 400 B.c. Somewhere between 
these two extremes there is no sufficient reason to 
doubt Gotama lived and did notable work. The 
general belief among Buddhists now is that he was one 
of the highest gods, and became incarnate to teach 
mankind the way of peace. Monstrous legends are 
current concerning his birth and after career, and these 
vary in the different countries where the religion now 


Panthetsm. 43 


prevails. Mr. Edwin Arnold has put some of them 
into a pleasing English dress. His ‘Light of Asia’ 
gives the story of Buddha as adorned in the course of 
centuries with miraculousadditions. It is alsoadapted — 
to English tastes by a tincture of Christian thought 
and Biblical phraseology. So faras the main facts can 
be sifted from what is fabulous, it would appear that 
Gotama was reared with the utmost delicacy and care. 
An indulgent father surrounded him with all the 
luxuries the Orient could furnish, and strove to conceal 
from his sight the miseries of real life. In a noble and 
reflective nature this led to a tremendous reaction. 
When the woes of his fellow-creatures burst upon his 
unaccustomed sight, they produced a shock which is 
never felt in so severe a form by those who grow up 
from infancy in familiarity with the changes and 
sorrows of existence. The horror produced by the 
discovery of disease, old age and death led Gotama to 
hate life, and to curse birth as the parent of all suc- 
ceeding evils. The love of wife and child became a 
torture when he saw the shadow of sickness and death 
spread over their beauty. From all his splendour and 
ease he fled into solitude, and there through years of 
terrible conflict with doubts and passions he passed into 
a state of serene superiority to his lower nature, and 
was filled with a blissful faith in the attainment of 
eventual peace. The course of his own experience and 
reflection taught him what appeared the only true rest ° 
for man, viz., Nirvana, the repose of Unconsciousness, 
and also the four-staged path by which that repose can 
be reached. Filled with confidence in himself as 
Buddha, the ‘ enlightened one,’ Gotama returned to the 


A4 Lhe Mystery of God. 


society of men, and devoted his days to the instruc- 
.tion of the people. 

There has been much debate as to the precise idea 
represented by the word Nirvana. Some say—and 
their opinion seems now undeniably correct—that 
Nirvana differs in no important respect from the 
Brahma of the older creed. Others, of less authority, 
and with manifestly deficient data, assert that it is 
precisely what we understand by immortal life. 

Among these latter must be mentioned Mr. Edwin 
Arnold, whose views of Buddhism have probably been 
more widely read in this country than any others. 
We should not criticize a poem founded on myths for 
not presenting strict history or exact philosophy; but 
unfortunately, Mr. Arnold claims in his preface to have 
given a true account of the Buddhist doctrine of Nir- 
vana. He there informs us that he has a ‘firm con- 
viction that a third of mankind would never have been 
brought to believe in blank abstractions, or in Nothing- 
ness, as the issue and crown of Being.’* This convic- 
tion is probably shared by all who have thought upon 
the subject ; but inasmuch as the popular Buddhism of 
China, Ceylon, and Thibet is not supposed by any 
scholar to represent the philosophic tenets of the 
creed, Mr. Arnold might have perceived that the 
acknowledged repugnance of mankind to abstractions 
and Nothingness affords no criterion of what Nirvana 
means to philosophic minds. 

Professor Blackie, whose poetic fervour is so ad- 
mirable, devotes several eloquent pages to the task of 
proving that Nirvana is the same conception as the 

* «The Light of Asia,’ Preface, p. xv. 


Panthers. ay 


‘eternal Sabbath’ of a Christian’s hope. ‘It is in fact,’ 
he insists, ‘ our eternal life, and nothing else;’* and then 
proceeds to quote a few passages from Buddhist writ- 
ings to sustain his assertion. These passages are too. 
long for citation here; but it is rather remarkable that 
the word Nirvana does not occur in any one of them. 
Buddhists believe in several stages of deepening calm 
and peace through which what we call the soul must 
pass to reach Nirvana. These intermediate stages are 
really the ultimate objects of desire to the multitude, 
and it is with them that the bulk of their religious 
poetry is concerned. It is idle, therefore, to quote 
words as illustrative of the meaning of Nirvana, with- 
out its being shown that they really refer to this finality 
of being. It would be about as wise to accept a de- 
scription of Greenland as a scientific account of the 
earth at the North Pole. But in addition to this 
fallacy, Professor Blackie, though keenly alive to the 
Western error of attaching a literal significance to 
Oriental language, has been betrayed into this very 
mistake while in the act of denouncing it. He has 
taken such terms as ‘life,’ ‘existence,’ and ‘the gate 
of immortality’ to mean what they would mean in 
England, whereas they are often used by Eastern poets 
and sages, whether Buddhists or Hindoos, in a mystical 
sense, from which all notions of consciousness have 
been utterly eliminated. As against these views, which 
have been widely accepted in this country, and have 
led many to confess themselves charmed with the sweet 
‘Light of Asia,’ the testimony of Mr. Rhys Davids 
appears to be conclusive: ‘Buddhism does not 
* ©The Philosophy of Atheism,’ p. 148. 


46 Lhe Mystery of God. 


acknowledge the existence of a soul as a thing distinct 
_ from the parts and powers of man which are dissolved 
at death, and the Nirvana of Buddhism is simply ex- 
tinction.’* 

Gotama chiefly departed from his predecessors in 
India in his practical teachings respecting the right 
path to Nirvana, or Brahma. Many of his instruc- 
tions are very beautiful, and display a profound know- 
ledge of human nature. His morality has been repre- 
sented as equal to Christ’s, and his inculcation of self- 
sacrifice as not at all inferior. When the spirit of his 
doctrine is examined, however, it is found to be dia- 
metrically opposed to Christ’s. The final aim, ‘ eternal 
Nothingness,’ vitiated all the means to be adopted for 
its attainment. He said men might escape their tor- 
menting sense of sin and dissatisfied desire, yet not as 
Christ teaches, by receiving a richer, fuller life, but 
through the extermination of all desire by a process 
of emotional starvation. The inspiration of his teach- 
ing, therefore, is despair, not hope. He said, Fight self; 
do the things you wish not to do; render to others the 
most repugnant and arduous services: but do it so that 
you may cease more speedily to retain the slightest 
clinging to life, so that you may most effectually stay 
the illusion of individual consciousness. With a warm 
colouring of Christian sentiment thrown over its cynical 
and despondent spirit, combined with a judicious sup- 
pression of all that is inconvenient, the so-called ‘ Light 
of Asia’ may be made to seem as pure as ‘ The Light of 
the World.’ Ifthe one, however, be light, the other is 
darkness, and the morality of Buddha is as unlike the 


* ‘Encyclo. Brit.’ ninth cditicn ; article, ‘Buddhisin’ 


Pantheism. 47 


morality of Christ, as the Nothingness of Nirvana is 
unlike the joyous life of the holy cities which in Christ’s 
teaching are the ‘many mansions’ of our Heavenly 
Father’s House. 

It may be well to repeat that the Buddhism here 
criticised is not the popular Buddhism of China and 
Ceylon, or of any existent people. The religion which 
lives under this name is not a philosophic Pantheism, 
but a gross Polytheism. People never want to become 
Nothing, or to be lost in the ‘ Great All,’ until they have 
either thought themselves into a thicket of metaphysical 
conundrums or sinned themselves into a sense of utter 
and irretrievable ruin. What men long for all the 
world over is a better life, and Buddhism has accom- 
modated itself to that craving. Gotama never wor- 
shipped any material idol or ideal god. The chief 
sight in every Buddhist temple is now an image of the 
sreat teacher himself. Chinamen and Cingaiese look 
forward, not to extinction, but simply to escape the 
doom of going down again into the bestial state. 
Short of Nirvana, therefore, the popular creed has 
invented an endless host of happy gods, and the people 
are encouraged to believe they may ascend to their 
level and there abide, unless, indeed, when in that state 
they should change their minds, and aspire to join the 
elect in Nothingness. In China the religion has thriven 
mainly through the invention of a goddess of Mercy, 
who was just at the point of entering Nirvana, but 
drew back out of pity for men, and consented to live 
for their sakes. Hence its power has been not in its 
Pantheistic theory of existence, which denies _per- 
sonality, but in the presentation of tales about self- 


48 The Mystery of God. 


denying and loving persons who, like the mythic 
Buddha, have surrendered their own blessedness to 
save men from sin and woe. It is an amazing witness 
to the fact that Pantheism is a denial of all that men 
have most reason to believe about themselves, anda 
refusal of all their natures yearn for now and _ here- 
after. It confirms the assertion of Christianity, that 
the coming of a compassionate and self-sacrificing 
Saviour from above is man’s deepest need; and 
Christian thinkers may cherish hopes that Gotama 
and many Buddhists have found that the true rest 
for human spirits is not in endless sleep, but in a more 
wakeful life, and that their passionate craving for love 
and redemption has found a nobler answer than the 
extinction of desire, even in the satisfaction of every 
holy aspiration, by looking upon and resembling one 
who is the image, not of Brahma, but Jehovah—not 
the No-thing which is and is not, but the great ‘I AM,’ 
the living and self-existent Cause and Maker and Re- 
deemer of men. 

Pantheism first appears in Greek speculation in the 
teachings of the Eleatic school, founded by Xeno- 
phanes. His great aim was to disabuse men’s minds 
of ideas about the gods contained in the poems of 
Homer and Hesiod. He declared, ‘There is one 
mightiest God among gods and men, like to mortals 
in neither body nor mind. Men, however, imagine,’ 
said he, ‘that the gods are born, are clothed in our 
garments, and endowed with our form and figure. 
But if oxen or lions had hands, and could paint and 
fashion things as men do, they too would form the 


Pantheisnt. 49 


gods after their own similitude, horses making them 
like horses, and oxen like oxen.’ 

It would appear from this extract that Xenophanes 
was not aware how much more commonly men had 
shaped their gods like animals than like men. It was 
a hard cut at Homeric theology, and one full of wise 
suggestiveness for alltime. As often quoted, however, 
and paraphrased to discredit the idea of consciousness 
and intelligence in the Supreme Being, it is a ludicrous 
self-refutation. If oxen or lions had power to paint 
and fashion things, and to conceive a god, they would 
be what now they are not; viz., thinking beings like 
man; and their god would then be a conscious and 
thinking being also, whatever they deemed his form. 
Xenophanes, therefore, by this sarcastic. argument, 
fairly demolished idolatry: but at the same time he 
unwittingly posited conscious intelligence as the essence 
of the Deity under any form or apart from any fashion 
or similitude whatever. Having got rid, as he thought, 
of any sort of personality in God, he still believed in 
the unity and reality of the universe, and, as Aristotle 
beautifully says, ‘looking wistfully upon the whole 
heaven, he affirms that unity is God.’* 

Having made this the basis of all thinking, the 
Greek sage was caught in the same thicket as the 
Hindoo; for how could he account for the moving, 
variable, and bewildering aspect of the world as com- 
prising many objects? Having decided that all that 
is is one, and that this one is permanent and un- 
changeable completeness of being, he had no room in 
his Pie ase for anything else; accordingly, he was 

* ‘Metaphysics,’ Book I,, Chap. v. 


50 The Mystery of God. 


driven to say that the world, as we perceive it by the 
-senses, is unreal, and has no existence in and for itself, 
but only for the human mind. 

Parmenides followed in the same line, and Xeno 
brought these ideas into complete agreement with 
Brahmanism in all except terminology by explicitly 
denying any sort of existence to the sensible world, 
even as relative to the mind. His word Being equals 
Brahma, and his ‘ not Being’ equals ‘ Maya ’—illusion, 
and specifically the illusion of supposing one’s self to 
have any Being. About the same time lived Heraclitus. 
He is generally classed among the Materialists, but, as 
already mentioned, he appears to have regarded fire 
not as the primary substance but as a symbol for cease- 
less motion. Heraclitus saw that the immovable Being | 
of the Eleatics was no Being at all. It did not account 
for the existence of the phenomena treated as illusions, 
or for the existence of any finite beings to be deceived 
by appearances. It failed to recognise that thought 
is a process, and therefore involves movement and 
variety as well as unity. Taking warning, then, from 
the fatal mistake of beginning with an unchangeable 
whole, which eternally excludes changeable parts and 
changeable phenomena, he started with movement, and 
said, ‘There is no being, nothing really is, but all 
things are in a ceaseless course of becoming.’ Like 
Xenophanes and his school, he distrusted the senses, 
but for an opposite reason. They said: ‘The senses 
tell us that the universe is in endless flux and change, 
but this is false, for Reason declares that the All 
is everlasting sameness.’ Heraclitus said: ‘The 
senses tell us the universe is permanent being, whereas 


Pantheism. 51 


Reason proves that it is not, but is always in a state of 
transition, passing from what was to what is to be, but 
ceasing to be what we say it is even while we speak. 
It is all one, all God, eternally coming into existence, 
but never remaining the same.’ 

This may seem nonsense to some minds, but there 
was a marvellous force of reason and insight in this 
thinker, and he has been followed by Hegel, whose 
mysterious teachings are appropriately called a secret. 
To get a glimpse of what this theory of eternal Becom- 
ing means, let me ask my reader a question: ‘Do you 
exist in the past, the present, or the future?’ You say, 
of course, ‘In the present.’ But do you? The time 
that was still future when you began to read the above 
question has become past—but then you are not in the 
past ; the end of my present sentence is in the future 
—and you are not in that. But no, that again is past! 
While you take your metaphysical razor to cleave past 
and future asunder they are blended together and are 
gone. You are, and yet you are only becoming— 
physically and mentally you are running out of one 
condition into another, but are never stationary. So 
it is with all things. The river is for ever running, 
but the waters are never the same. The trees are 
for ever growing, yet as ceaselessly they are changing 
their substance and form. The stars are never for 
one millionth part of a second in the same relative 
positions in space. Light is for ever journeying, but 
never pauses to be. The end of one state of being is 
always passing into and becoming the commencement 
of another. So Heraclitus escaped the inexorable 
logic of the Hindoo and the Eleatic sages. He had 


4—2 


52 The Mystery of God. 


found an ‘All’ and a ‘One’ which was also many, 
-a unity which was also diversity; and his daring 
formula, ‘everything is and is not,’ when limited to 
the visible universe, is one of the truest and most 
useful deliverances that metaphysics ever produced. 
It tends to harmonize the teachings of the reason 
and of the senses, the observations of physical science, 
and the abstract conclusions of the intellect. It is, 
however, an inadequate theory of the universe. It 
describes the process of the ages, but it cries aloud 
fora beginning. It is an alphabet without an Alpha 
or an Omega, a first or a last. It is motion without a 
start, and without a goal, and it leaves unsolved the 
problem, ‘ Whence comes the philosophic mind which 
observes the ceaseless flow of the outward universe and 
yet retains its sense of personal identity, and its con- 
viction of responsibility for things done in the past ?’ 
Behind the universe of change some everlasting Power 
is a necessity of thought, and that Power must be a 
very different sort of Being from the dead immovable 
Nothingness from which Heraclitus scornfully turned 
aside; very different also from the Nothing which is 
always tending to become something, but never attaining 
to absolute Being, of Heraclitus and Hegel, his modern 
child. 

The latest and most popular form which Pantheism 
assumed among the Greeks was that taught by Zeno 
of Cyprus, the founder of the Stoical philosophy. The 
Stoics were very numerous, and consequently varied 
greatly in their views, but held that there is a great 
Reason or Soul of all things working in and through 
matter, and having no existence apart from it. All 


Panthetsm. 53 


things, including men, are parts of God, having 
emanated by necessity from Him, and returning to 
Him again by dissolution. There was, therefore, no 
really independent life and no free will; all was fixed © 
and inevitable. Like Buddha, therefore, they taught 
that the wise man is he who detaches his mind from 
the pleasures and ambitions of the vulgar, and holds 
himself ready to escape from all miseries and misfor- 
tunes by death. Zeno, their founder, adorned his 
doctrine by suicide, and this example was extensively 
followed by his disciples, who thus showed how little 
they had of stoicism in the now popular idea of that 
word. Their morality, as Professor Seeley, himself a 
Pantheist, says, was never much above ‘ suicide point.’ 
They were happier, however, than Buddhists, in this 
—they were tormented with no fear of transmigration, 
and, according to their theory, suicide was easy. In- 
stead of a weary process of striving to think about the 
one which is nothing, and has no second, their road to 
Nirvana was very brief. A warm bath with an opened 
vein, a cup of hemlock or an inch of polished steel, gave 
an end to all desire, and the wise man could thus at any 
moment enter into rest. 

It would be wearisome and useless to trace out the 
many modifications of Pantheism which found a fleet- 
ing currency during the early and middle ages of 
Christian history ; and without missing anything essen- 
tial to our theme, we may leap over a gulf of centuries 
to Spinoza, who is generally regarded as the founder 
of modern Pantheism. He is now known to have 
copied largely from Bruno, who was burned at Rome 
for heresy in 1600 A.D. There seems, however, little 


54 The Mystery of God. 


doubt that in his later days Bruno ceased to be in any 
-true sense a Pantheist. Spinoza may be allowed, there- 
fore, to give his name to doctrines derived in the main 
from Bruno’s earlier writings. 

Spinoza fell into the same initial mistake as Xeno- 
phanes and his school. Instead of beginning with the 
observed order of nature and the human mind which 
observes, and so reasoning up towards the unity it 
is the business of philosophy to discover, he started 
with a definition of God, and then had to make the 
facts of the universe fit in with that arbitrary assump- 
tion. His fundamental position is that nothing exists 
but the self-existent. Whatever can be thought of as 
not being, has no being. Hence substance is one and 
eternal. Anything created would not be self-existent ; 
and as only the self-existent exists, nothing can have 
been created, and the idea is an illusion. Everything 
that exists is a part of God, who is infinite substance 
constituted by an infinity of attributes. Everything is 
but a mode of His attributes, which express the essence 
of His substance. Hence there is no independent and 
accountable life in man. There is no moral obligation, 
no right and wrong, for all our thoughts and actions 
are modes of God’s activity. All our ideas of personal 
responsibility and of a created universe are unreal. 
Thus the modern Pantheist fails as utterly to account 
for the things we want accounted for as the Hindoo, 
the Buddhist, and the Greek. Having presumed to 
tell us what substance is, and to call it God, he has no 
room even for himself in his imaginary universe. 

After Spinoza, Hegel, though unintentionally, has 
done more than any modern thinker to diffuse Pan- 


Panthersi. 5 


theistic ideas. He was to Spinoza what Heraclitus 
was to the Eleatics. He saw that Spinoza’s self- 
existent substance was no more an explanation of the 
universe than Zeno’s Being, and so revived the notion 
of Becoming. He regarded Thought as the ultimate 
reality (or God) which harmonized the two notions of 
Being and Becoming. This is the true explanation 
of his oft-repeated formula that Thought is the unity 
of Being and non-Being. Universal history is the 
necessary development of Godintime. Natural objects 
—worlds, men, animals, plants, minerals, vapours— 
are allso many modes of Divine manifestation. The 
goal towards which all things are tending is God 
realizing Himself in finite existence, and especially in 
man’s moral consciousness. 

We have now to look upon the latest developments 
of Pantheism, and to see how it leads in Europe to 
results not unlike those already seen in India. The 
ripest and latest fruit of German Pantheism is Pes- 
simism; and Pessimism is Buddhism stripped of 
mythological ideas and clothed in European language. 
Arthur Schopenhauer, the founder of Pessimism as a 
reasoned system of thought, affirmed that Will is the 
ultimate principle of all things, the one universal sub- 
stance. This Willis unconscious, but becomes conscious 
through its very nature, which is to strive for life and 
the consequent development of intellect. It can have 
no peace until it becomes unconscious once more 
through a renunciation of the will to live. This world 
is a mockery, and is as bad a world as could be con- 
ceived, because it is just endurable. If it were a little 
worse it would be better, because then men would no 


56 Lhe Mystery of God. 


longer wish to live, and with their ceasing to desire 
. life, life would cease. He would recommend suicide, 
but that is too strong an assertion of will to be wise. 
The only real suicide is Buddha’s self-denial—death by 
the refusal to satisfy hunger of every sort. (The German, 
however, presents a mournful contrast to the Indian 
Pantheist in the manner of his actual life.) Progress 
and human elevation are really curses, not blessings; 
for the more cultivated the mind, the more miserably 
conscious men become. 

With various modifications, a considerable school of 
disciples now teach these doctrines. They earnestly 
hope that the world will gradually reach a point of 
misery when the whole human race will refuse to beget 
children, or simultaneously put an end to themselves to 
escape the snares of desire, and so the goal of uncon- 
sciousness—Nirvana—be reached. But lest this should 
seem too consolatory a prospect, they all confess the 
possibility, and some assert the certainty, that the 
eternal substance, Will, will reassert itself, because 
oblivious of its awful experience, and so the doleful 
tragedy of the universe begin afresh. 

But it may be urged, ‘Surely there is no necessary 
connection between Pantheism and these mournful con- 
clusions! The theory is commonly associated with 
men of refined and poetic spirit, of intensely reverent 
and even saintly disposition.’ I have no wish to-over- 
look any of these facts; but the men who answer to 
this description are either not real Pantheists in theory, 
or are devout and holy in spite of their creed, not be- 
cause of it. Whether we call the whole universe 
Matter, or Spirit, or God, if it be all one substance, 


Panthetsm. | 57 


with no Being reigning over it and administering His 
own Will as Law, there is no moral responsibility. If 
we are all fragments of God, He cannot find fault with 
us. We are of necessity what we are, and can be no 
other. Our sense of choice and self-direction is a 
mistake; we have no life of our own; we are but 
modes of His being. When a so-called Pantheist 
prays, he is praying to an unconscious whole, of which 
he himself is a part. The offerer and receiver of prayer 
are one. The worshipper and the object of worship 
are confounded together. Self-reproach is absurd, re- 
pentance an illusion, sanctification a foolish attempt 
to improve what is Eternal and unalterable, yea, 
Divine. 

Some professed Pantheists worship Christ as the 
fullest and best presentment of the Great All. But, 
according to their theory, He is no more a manifestation 
of God than Pilate was, or Judas Iscariot, or Barabbas, 
or any poor vagrant wandering in our modern cities. 
The repulsiveness of such a suggestion is the condem- 
nation of the theory; but the theory itself is plain: 
God is everything. All that is is God. Love and 
gravitation, human hearts and tigers’ hearts, and 
things without heart, apostles, martyrs, saints, and 
debauchees, are all modes of the One Being, and all 
express, as Spinoza insists, some essence of His nature. 
Storm, decay, disease, crime, all things, are flowing on 
by unalterable and involuntary movement towards some 
unimaginable future; but the individual consciousness 
is but a fleeting phase of the All, and will know nothing 
of any glories to be revealed. We shall all, according 
to this theory, be absorbed in the absolute unconscious- 


58 The Mystery of God. 


ness: Brahma is the goal of all Pantheistic thought, © 
_and not a Father’s House. 

If further proof be demanded that these are irresist- 
ible corollaries of Pantheism, and that its real advo- 
cates know them to be so, however much disliked, it 
may be found in Professor Seeley’s book, called ‘ Na- 
tural Religion ;’ the most noticeable attempt to teach 
Pantheism as a religion in recent English literature. 

Mr. Seeley so defines Nature as not only to include | 
God, but to constitute God. In his vocabulary, God 
and Nature are interchangeable terms, although he 
uses them in most fluctuating and contradictory senses. 
He dismisses the personal God of Christianity, because 
in his estimation ‘ personality involves mortality’ and 
‘a body.’ He is aware that both Christians and 
Atheists have insisted that Pantheism, by identifying 
Nature with God, is resolvable into Atheism, but he 
strives to evade this just criticism by defining Atheism 
as the want of any ‘ Theory of the universe’ (p. 36). 
If a man has a theory, and believes in ‘ any regularity 
in the universe, to which a man must conform himself 
under penalties’ (p. 27), he is a Theist ! If he believes 
only in material laws, Mr. Seeley will not allow him to 
be called an Atheist, although he may personally glory 
in that designation. Of course, if such a definition of 
Theism be admitted, the most dogmatic Atheist is a 
more thoroughgoing Theist than a cautious Agnostic 
who thinks there may perhaps be a God, but declines 
to theorize! Indeed, according to Mr. Seeley, Miss 
Martineau was as firm and consistent a Theist as the 
Apostle Paul, for she was quite as decided in her theory 
of the universe. If the charge cf Atheism can only be 


Pantheism. 59 


escaped by such reckless slaughter of language, Pan- 
theists are clearly Atheists in the hitherto received 
sense of that word. 

To find room in Pantheism for worship, Mr. Seeley » 
shows the same generosity to the word ‘worship.’ This 
he defines as ‘admiration,’ sublimely ignoring the fact 
that there are more religions of fear than of reverence 
andadoration. So doing, he benevolently finds worship 
in all art, however bad its moral tone, and even ina 
voluptuary’s pleasure in sensuous beauty (p. 95). How- 
ever fair and liberal this teaching may seem when 
wrapped up in literary gauze and shone upon by the 
footlights of fancy, it is unspeakably repulsive when 
viewed in its naked ugliness and in the daylight of 
calm criticism. From a writer capable of such offences 
it would be a relief to pass at once; but Mr. Seeley has 
wide influence, and through his book must be placed 
in the witness-box to prove against himself and his 
school of thinkers the truth of what has been said 
about the connection of Pantheism with immorality 
and despair. 

Take first the question of morality. We have what 
we call a conscience. We are conscious of inward 
strife between transient inclination and permanent 
convictions of duty. We blame ourselves for one set 
of actions, and are raised in self-respect by another. 
Ages before men reasoned about the data of Ethics 
and the evolution of moral judgments, the Hebrews 
possessed a moral code which has never been surpassed, 
and has proved itself salt and light to the world. 
That moral code was founded on the principle that 

man is subject to another and higher will: that over 


60 Lhe Mystery of God. 


man, and ‘so distinct from him as to be a Lawgiver, 
King, and Judge, an Eternally Righteous and un- 
changeable God reigns. By this conviction men’s lives 
have been governed, and brought into a measure of 
internal order and social harmony not otherwise 
attained. But Pantheism sweeps away Lawgiver, King, 
and Judge. We are all constituent portions of God, 
and we act out the eternal laws of our being. Here, 
then, is the crux. Can Pantheism escape this dis- 
solution of morals? Mr. Seeley, with many evidences 
of doubt and fear, attempts to show that it can. To 
escape the charge of Atheism he invents, as already 
seen, an Atheistic definition of Theism ; to evade the 
charge of immoral tendencies he invents an immoral 
definition of morality, and sends our consciences adrift 
by sneering at ‘conventional morality.’ With a true 
literary instinct, and with a full knowledge of an 
English reader’s preference for concrete facts, he stakes 
his position on the lives of two men whom he calls 
Pantheists. The men whom he honours with selection 
for this high position are Goethe and Wordsworth, and 
at great length he discusses their characters as men who 
illustrate and adorn the moral tendencies of his creed. 
This is how he writes of Goethe: ‘As to the attacks 
made upon him by the Pietists and the conventional 
moralists, it might be easy to defend him in general by 
denying that the religious mode of a given time and 
place is to be identified with Christianity, or that 
received proprieties are an infallible standard of 
morality’ (p. 98). If this sentence only meant that the 
German poet was impatient of Mrs. Grundy, we could 
most of us endorse it; but it is expressly meant to cover 


Pantheisne. 61 


Goethe’s impurity, unfaithfulness, and gross selfishness 
in the treatment of women. After praising the poet’s 
industry and one or two other ‘rare virtues,’ Mr. Seeley 
makes this admission: ‘There remains the fact that | 
the idea of duty and self-sacrifice appears not to be 
very sacred in his mind; rather perhaps to be irritating, 
embarrassing, odious to him.’ Here, then, is a selected 
model of Pantheistic morality, a man to whom the 
idea of ‘ duty’ is ‘ odious’! 

Passing from Goethe to Wordsworth, Mr. Seeley 
has no immoralities to confess. ‘He may be called,’ 
he observes, ‘ the saint of the religion of Nature (7.¢., of 
Pantheism), on account of the unworldliness both of 
his life and of his writings’ (p. 101). But here a pre- 
liminary question arises: Has Pantheism any right 
to claim Wordsworth as its saint? Space forbids a 
critical examination of Wordsworth’s religious views, 
but it would be superfluous. Mr. Seeley is in the 
witness-box ; let him bear testimony. After four pages 
of eloquent and just eulogium of Wordsworth’s cha- 
racter, he lets fall this admission: ‘ No doubt Words- 
worth’s worship of the God in Nature was blended with 
Christian ideas. A Christian faith in redemption and 
reconciliation neutralized his sense of the evil which is 
in the world, and preserved him from the Pessimism 
which is the besetting difficulty of natural religion’ 
(p. 104). The saint of Pantheism therefore turns out 
after all to be a Christian, while the poet to whom duty 
was ‘odious’ was an undoubted Pantheist. This is the 
selected evidence that Pantheism is not unfavourable 
to morality! 

Let us now hear what this witness has to say about 


62 Lhe Mystery of God. 


the terrible gloom of Pessimism which we have seen 
gathering over the minds of Pantheists in India and 
China, and Greece and Germany. The question stands 
thus: ‘Is Pessimism an accidental circumstance, or is 
it the natural product of the theory?’ Having toiled 
through many chapters to prove that there is not, and 
cannot be, a personal God reigning over all things, and 
that the idea of his existence can be dispensed with, 
without hurt to man’s moral and religious character, or 
to the well-being of society, the shadow of failure falls 
darkly on his own spirit, and he writes words which 
show how unable he is to rest in his own conclusions: 
“When it is admitted that religion deals in the first 
instance with the known and natural, then we may well 
begin to doubt whether the known and natural can 
suffice for human life. No sooner do we begin to think 
so, than Pessimism raises its head’ (p. 261); i.¢., no 
sooner do we begin to believe that science and art are 
religion, because nature is God, known through science 
and worshipped in art, than all light of hope fails, and 
despondent gloom settles down upon the spirit. This 
is surely a most remarkable admission on the part of 
one who has written a book for the express purpose of 
proving the reality and sufficiency of Natural Religion, 
which is the admiration of Nature as God. But these 
words are followed by many more in the same vein, 
some of which may usefully be quoted here: 

‘The more our thoughts widen and deepen, as the 
universe grows upon us, and we become accustomed to 
boundless space and time, the more petrifying is the 
contrast of our own insignificance, the more con- 
temptible become the pettiness, shortness, fragility of 


Panthetsut. 63 


the individual life. A moral paralysis creeps over us. 
For a while we comfort ourselves with the notion of 
self-sacrifice; we say, ‘‘ What matter if I pass?—let me 
think of others!’ But the other becomes contemptible 
no less than the self: all human griefs alike seem little 
worth assuaging ; human happiness too paltry at the 
best to be worth increasing. The whole moral world 
is reduced to a point; the spiritual city, “‘the goal of 
all the saints”? dwindles to ‘‘the least of little stars; 
good and evil, right and wrong, become infinitesimal, 
ephemeral matters, while eternity and infinity remain 
attributes of that only which is outside the realm of 
morality. Life becomes more intolerable the more we 
know and discover, so long as everything widens and 
deepens except our own duration, and that remains as 
pitiful as ever. The affections die away in a world 
where everything great and enduring is cold; they die 
of their own conscious feebleness and bootlessness.’ 

‘Supernatural Religion met this want by connecting 
Love and Righteousness with eternity. If it is shaken, 
how shall its place be supplied? And what would 
Natural Religion avail then ?’ 

‘But still, if religion fails, it is only when human life 
is proved to be worthless.’ 

It would be difficult to find in all literature a more 
mournful specimen of conscious failure and despondency 
than these words supply. Natural Religion, or Pan- 
theism, is of no avail to explain and justify, much less 
to satisfy, the irrepressible sense of reality and responsi- 
bility which man possesses, or to place before him a 
destiny commensurate with his unquenchable aspira- 
tions. It cannot avail to give strength to righteousness, 


64 The Mystery of God. 


or hope to endeavour, or to save the purest affections 
from becoming the instruments of our most horrible 
torture, when the grave hides the corruption of those 
we have loved. Nirvana thus becomes the only refuge 
and rest for those who have passed the few brief 
years when bounding blood and the mirage of earthly 
happiness exclude distressing thoughts about the world- 
wide facts of disease, calamity, cruelty, old age, and 
death. The only consolation for the loss of Super- 
natural Religion the Pantheist has to offer is that 
human life is proved by his own theory to be worthless. 
Professor Seeley thus, in spite of all his promises and 
assurances, brings his readers on the road to the same 
black goal as the ancient Hindoo Sages, and as 
Buddha, and Zeno, and the German Pessimists. So 
the cold, dark night of discontent ever follows the 
joyous day of nature-worship. The soul rejoices in the 
light of the sun, and is lost in ecstasy as the western 
sky burns into redness, and gleams into ever-changing 
glories of purple and green and gold; but these glories 
are the beauties of fading light, they are the farewell 
smiles of day.- So passes the day-time of Pantheistic 
worship, and the night cometh when no man can be 
glad without a God beyond the setting sun; and in 
that night where Nature fails us, and God is denied, 
men do the deeds of darkness, and presently they learn 
to praise ‘the dead which are already dead more than 
the living which are yet alive.’ ‘ For the living know 
that they shall die, but the dead know not anything.’ 
Voltaire once said that if there were no moral ruler 
it would be necessary to invent one to keep the world 
in order. The history of Materialism and Pantheism 


Pantheism. 65 


shows that he rightly judged the absolute impossibility 
of any moral order without a Central and Supreme 
Administrator of Justice, and a recognised basis of 
moral obligation in His character and will. The 
moral consequences of Atheism pertain to any theory 
of the universe which excludes this Higher than man. 
To call everything God is only playing with words. 
Call the universe matter or mind, designate the 
universal substance as fire, water, motion, thought, 
mud, dust, or God, and it makes no practical dif- 
ference, for the phenomena are the same. If it be 
only one thing, and so including ourselves, it is grind- 
ing out an evolution which no one directs or judges, 
and which cannot be modified or controlled—all 
notions of liberty are Maya. If there be no power 
possessing the essential attributes of personality with- 
out those accidental limits which define each man; 
if there be no Father of our spirits, and we are 
not so far separate from external nature as to be 
capable of obedience and disobedience; if there be 
therefore no sin in what we call wrong, and so no 
hope of correction, forgiveness, renewal of mind, and 
sanctification from a Redeeming God; if Nothingness 
be the goal of our involuntary race,—then Buddha was 
right and Jesus Christ was wrong. Then, too, the 
German Pessimists are right, and so-called progress, 
which raises the standard of endeavour, is an evil; all 
culture of the affections and the intellect is but an 
increase of sorrow and illusion, and then, instead of 
fighting the good fight of faith, to lay hold of eternal 
life, it must be man’s wisdom to fight the good fight 
of mental and emotional suicide, and so hasten his 


X) 


66 The Mystery of God. 


passage into the Eternal Sleep that knows no 
dreams. 

The only refuge from this inexorable conclusion—a 
conclusion arrived at by the consistent Pantheists of 
all ages and nations—is faith in God such as Abraham 
cherished, and such as, in spite of inveterate tendencies 
to fall back into Natural Religion, the Hebrew people 
were disciplined to hand down as a heritage for the 
world. That faith, purified, expanded, and adapted by 
Christ to the moral, intellectual, and heartfelt needs of 
mankind, is the only theory which recognises all the 
sad and terrible facts of human history and external 
nature, yet breathes into its recipients a spirit of power, 
and love, and a courageous joy of hope. It is the only 
system which teaches the abiding reality and sacred 
worth of life, yet bids men sacrifice it cheerfully for the 
sake of righteousness, because to lay down life in such 
a cause is to gain life more abundantly. Of course, the 
beauty and desirability of such a faith is no sure 
evidence of its truth. Thus far we have only seen 
the impotence of Materialistic or Pantheistic creeds to 
satisfy the intellect, the heart, or the conscience of 
men, and how defenceless they appear when the 
weapons of criticism they have drawn against Chris- 
tianity are unsheathed against themselves. In future 
pages the difficulties of faith in the God of the Bible 
will be considered, and more positive reasons be ad- 
vanced for holding fast the confidence of so many 
generations firm unto the end. ~ 


CIAL DERG. 
THEISM. 


THE word Theism is really the same as Deism, but it 
carries with it a different set of associations. Deism 
(from the Latin word for God) was the chief form of 
anti-Christian thought in the eighteenth century. It 
was a theory which held the existence of a Personal 
God as a conclusion of the natural reason, but. re- 
pudiated alike the need for and the possibility of any 
revelation beyond the works of Nature. The name 
was thoroughly discredited by the issue of the ‘ Deistic 
Controversy,’ and no one now cares to fight under 
that flag. Under the term Theism (from the Greek 
word for God) similar opinions are still held, but so 
widely have circumstances changed, that these self- 
styled Theists are now ranged on the side of Belief, 
while infidelity has assumed more pronounced forms 
of antagonism to all that is called God. In a future 
chapter it will be necessary to examine the claims of 
their religious system, and to expose the straits into 
which they are driven when called upon to explain the 
mysteries of God’s moral government. Jews, Chris- 
tians, and Mohammedans, and indeed all who believe 
in a personal God, are properly called Theists, and as 
against Materialists and Pantheists have a common 
S-g 


68 The Mystery of God. 


article of faith. They all agree that the universal order 
- 1s due to the will of a self-existent Being, who is pos- 
sessed of Power, Wisdom, and Goodness. In fact, with 
the exception of a few small communities and some 
isolated thinkers, all Theists confess the God of Abra- 
ham as their God. | 

It may be advisable in this place to make a passing 
reference to Mr. Matthew Arnold, who has laboured to 
recommend the Bible to the ‘ intellectual earnestness’ 
of our day, by declaring the Hebrews’ God to be an 
impersonal energy. It is rather difficult to define this 
writer’s position. Dr. Hunt* claims him asa Pantheist. 
But what sort of Pantheism is that which defines God 
as ‘the power zot ourselves which makes for righteous- 
ness’? Mr. Arnold leaves room outside God, at any 
rate, for ‘ Philistines,’ and for an impersonal Satan, who 
must of course signify in the Bible ‘ the power not our- 
selves which makes for’ unrighteousness. He must 
therefore be more of a Parsee than a Pantheist, for his 
system contains at least ourselves and two powers not 
ourselves, the one evil, the other good. If he would 
print a Bible, or, say, Isaiah, with his definition of the 
Hebrew God given im extenso wherever the name of the 
Deity occurs, it would be at least a literary curiosity, and 
might do much to exhibit that old prophet’s ‘ lucidity.’ 
Mr. Arnold is only peculiar in the zeal he displays for 
purging the Bible of all that is distasteful to himself. 
So far as he directly argues against a Personal God, 
and against a miraculous revelation, his reasonings are 
but a literary treatment of ideas more forcibly put by 
other writers. Wherein he tries to show that the God 


* ¢Pantheism and Christianity,’ p. 326. 


Theism. 69 


of the Bible is an impersonal energy, he must be left 
to the reader’s sense of humour, which is of more value 
than either logic or metaphysics in detecting nonsense. 
Whether a Personal God be credible or incredible, there 
can be absolutely no doubt that the Hebrew Scriptures 
declare such a Being in the plainest words that man’s 
wit could put together. For thousands of years the 
word ‘God’ has been used to designate a Personal Ruler, 
and Theists from the days of Abraham have refused to 
acknowledge any image or imagination not possessed 
of conscious Life. If writers choose to affix a different 
meaning to the word, no one can prevent the incon- 
venience ; but at any rate this meaning is clear, and 
in speaking of Theists, Theism, and God, the words 
will be used in harmony with this definition. 

Before proceeding to state the reasons which directly 
teach that the universe owes its existence to a Personal 
God, it will be advisable to define more precisely what 
is meant by the term ‘personal.’ A great deal of be- 
wildering controversy has been caused by puerile con- 
ceptions of personality, and by deliberate attempts to 
fasten on the idea sundry human limitations which are 
utterly excluded from it in a Theist’s mind. The words 
in which Xenophanes satirized the elevation of man’s 
own image into an object of worship have already been 
quoted. This satire has been repeated in endless forms, 
and its general significance has been gathered up into 
one dreadful word, ‘anthropomorphic,’ which every 
anti-Theist feels it his duty to fling at the idea of a 
Personal God. 

There was some ground for the protests of Xeno- 
phanes and the Brahmans of India against the human 


70 Lhe Mystery of God. 


monstrosities worshipped as Divine in their days. 
These were not creators, even in theory, but only 
creatures born in time and devoid of any attributes to 
account for their own existence. But it has never yet 
been shown that personality necessarily involves these 
defects. Spinoza improved upon the sarcasm of 
Xenophanes, about horses, lions, and oxen painting 
gods in their own likeness, by saying that if a circle 
.could think, it would suppose the essence of deity to 
be circularity. But this only goes to show that even a 
circle, if it could think, would conceive of a thinking 
God, only (perhaps) in a circular form. It illustrates 
the extent to which we are dominated by the familiar 
association of certain attributes with particular acci- 
dents of figure, but it also shows how easy it is to 
conceive of the same attributes pertaining to a thinker 
who may have any figure or no figure at all; and it 
also confirms the truth that only a thinking being can 
imagine a God, much less be Divine. Similar mistakes 
run through an immense amount of current literature. 
‘Personality involves a body and mortality,’ affirms 
the author of ‘ Natural Religion.’ He does not attempt 
to prove this, but, having acquainted himself with 
all the persons in the universe, he assures us that 
they all have bodies, and will die! A fine illustration 
this, of the new alliance between Literature and 
Dogma! 

Mr. Spencer denies the existence of a conscious God, 
because consciousness ‘ is constituted of ideas and feel- 
ings caused by objects and occurrences,’* and therefore 
cannot precede them. But who can explain what this 


* Nineteenth Century, January, 1884. 


Thewsim. 71 


means? ‘Objects and occurrences’ cause ‘ideas and 
feelings,’ and these ‘constitute’ consciousness. Mr. 
Spencer may be catechised by idealists as to what he 
means by ‘ objects and occurrences ;’ but, granting the 
reality of these so-called external causes, we naturally 
inquire, How do they produce ideas and feelings? In 
whom or in what are these ideas and feelings caused ? 
Can ‘objects and occurrences’ produce ‘ideas and 
feelings’ without an already existing mind to be 
affected? Can they cause ‘ideas and feelings’ in a 
vacuum, or in an organism which is unthinking until 
mechanically acted upon by them? Let the experiment 
be tried on trees or dead bodies, and see what an 
‘object’ can effect by causing blows to ‘occur.’ But 
as trees and dead bodies cannot enlighten us as to 
their experiences, we will turn to our own. Am I, the 
conscious self, nowhere until I receive ideas and feelings 
from the outside? Is not my existence as subject 
postulated in the idea of certain objects affecting me? 
If not, it would be more correct, and far more explicit, to 
say that ‘objects and occurrences’ produce a conscious 
mind, and not merely that they cause ‘ideas and feel- 
ings.’ This, however, would still leave on Mr. Spencer’s 
hands the question how objects can exist apart from 
some subject to which they are related, and would open 
the still more bewildering question how these ‘ objects 
and occurrences’ became possessed of creative power. 
When the imposing terms in which the dictum is ex- 
pressed are thus analyzed, no thought remains to be 
discussed. One might as well talk about a telegraphic 
operator, sitting in a room with instruments connecting 
him with a hundred cities, as being constituted by the 


7a Lhe Mystery of God. 


clicking of needles caused by electric currents, as talk 
of a man’s consciousness being ‘ constituted’ in the 
way Mr. Spencer suggests. Object without subject is 
a word without a meaning. There can be no sights 
without a seer, no sounds without a hearer, and no 
sensations can be stimulated except in a conscious 
being. If there were ‘objects and occurrences’ before 
I existed as a conscious subject, they must by impli- 
cation have been related to some other subject. If 
they existed before any finite consciousness had been 
produced, it could only have been as related to the con- 
sciousness of an infinite Being. The argument, there- 
fore, by which Mr. Spencer would prove a conscious 
God an impossibility, not merely fails, but lends 
an unintended support to the position that the exist- 
ence of an Infinite Mind, who is a conscious Person, 
is the necessary correlate to the thought of a world of 
‘objects and occurrences,’ and shows that it would 
be more philosophical, as well as more religious, to 
say that the thoughts of His mind are the cause, and 
not the effects of those ‘objects and occurrences’ 
which make up the finite universe and its historic de- 
velopment. 

The fact that such a Being is not a metaphysical 
absurdity may not prove that He exists. Some have 
argued that it does, but few minds would thereby be 
convinced. It may most reasonably be held to givea 
strong evidence of probability, but even this may be 
waived. What it does unquestionably show is that the 
Theistic position cannot be put aside by saying that 
the thoughts of many of the greatest men of all ages 
have been unthinkable. The way is therefore clear for 


Thewsi. ne 


a statement of what is really meant by a Personal God 
in the discussion which ensues. 

By a Personal God Theists mean a Living Being 
who is not, like man, bounded by any bodily organism. ~ 
They hold that He does not depend therefore on a 
system of telegraphic nerves as instruments of com- 
munication with the material universe, and yet He is 
not unable to communicate therewith, having: modes 
which are as inscrutable as, though not more so than 
is, the connection between’ a man’s thought and the 
movement of his tongue. They regard Him as un- 
created, but able to originate and frame an objective 
universe: as absolute in Himself, but capable of 
making and setting things and persons in relations 
with Himself; whereas man can only discern the objects 
which are around him, and in the midst of which he is 
placed. They believe that to some extent this God 
is revealed in His works, yet is no more to be con- 
founded with them than an architect with his build- 
ings, or a father with his children. They hold that to 
this God belongs the Eternal Power which science 
declares must exist; the Wisdom which alone can 
account for the order in which Power is seen to 
operate, the Goodness without which infinite Power 
would be an eternal curse, and the Spontaneity of 
Volition without which power is only potentiality and 
every other attribute must be sterile. 

If these ideas be called ‘anthropomorphic,’ that 
ponderous term may well be accepted by Theists as a 
commendation rather than a reproach. If wisdom, 
goodness and volition be eliminated from the idea of 
God, nothing worth calling God is left. To say that 


74 The Mystery of God. 


He is not less, but more than a Personal Being, is 
worse than idle, for it is equivalent to saying that He 
is without attributes, and logically leads up to the 
absurdity of the Hindoo Brahma. The attributes 
ascribed by Theists to God are at least the highest our 
minds are capable of conceiving. Man is not Divine, 
but he is assuredly the noblest of things knowable to 
science. It cannot be unwise, then, to search for God 
in the direction indicated by a line drawn from the 
lowest elements to the loftiest heights of known intel- 
ligence and power. The elements have no knowledge 
or wisdom or self-direction. The waters cool and 
cleanse us without being glad; they engulph us without 
being grieved. The winds fan us in summer without 
kindness; they sweep away harvests and vessels without 
regret. Fire warms our homes in winter or burns a 
martyr’s body with equal indifference, and without 
being aware of what is done. So machines work on 
with the same precision, whether doing service or deal- 
ing death to mankind. The animals have scarcely any 
power to discern the results of theiracts. Among men, 
savages are dull in intellect and contracted in sympathy, 
but as mental and religious culture advances, man rises 
in ability to understand his fellows, to wish for and 
promote their welfare, to send forth his thoughts into 
far-off lands, and to establish intercourse with foreign 
races. Hecan acquire dominion over nature, and, by 
skilled conformity, can command the laws to which the 
elements are subject. He can conceive the idea of 
unity and order reigning throughout a universe which 
transcends his knowledge, and can rejoice in the hope 
of attaining to some communion with beings of kindred 


Thewsm. 75 


though superior faculties. Shall we think it wise, then, 
to go down again and liken God to blind forces and 
undiscerning elements or abstractions? Having climbed 
the highest hill we know, shall we plunge down a pre- 
cipice to find the Most High? Must we not still look 
up in the same direction of our ascent, and say, as we 
gaze into the pure blue of unmeasured heavens, “He 
looketh down upon these things.’ High as these heavens 
are above the earth, so much are His thoughts better 
than our thoughts, and His wisdom and goodness than 
our own!’? 

To most minds such an idea commends itself with 
self-evidencing power. History seems to show that 
only moral reluctance or intellectual bewilderment ever 
leads to its rejection when fairly presented for belief. 
Professor Tyndall, whose words have previously been 
quoted, is not alone in the confession that the theory 
which would dispense with such a Being does not com- 
mend itself to the mind ‘in hours of clearness and 
vigour,’ and that in the presence of stronger and 
healthier thought it ever dissolves and disappears.’ 
J. S. Mill, whose anti-Theistic reasonings will be 
criticised further on, was by no means convinced 
by them himself; and if any reader should mistrust 
his own judgment, let him be emboldened by the 
knowledge that the arguments he is asked to pro- 
nounce unsound reveal the inward dialogue of a mind 
resolutely set to face the darkest facts and most 
forbidding problems, but are not the conclusions in 
which he finally rested. Mill gave as the result of his 
deliberation an admission which should prepare every 
student of his essays for the discovery of many fallacies. 


76 The Mystery of God. 


‘It must be allowed,’ he observes, that in the present 
state of our knowledge the adaptations in Nature afford 
a large balance of probability in favour of creation by 
intelligence.’* Such an avowal, from so cautious and, 
by early training, so prejudiced a thinker, speaks 
volumes, and probably rather understates the inward 
persuasion of his mind. In this connection I may also 
take an opportunity to quote a few words spoken by 
David Hume which deserve to be carefully weighed 
by all who are perplexed by his writings, and by the 
writings of those scientific men who to-day repeat his 
ideas, and honour him as the founder of their philo- 
sophy. At the time of his mother’s death his excessive 
grief was ascribed by a friend to his loss of all Christian 
hopes, but he significantly replied: ‘Though I throw 
out my speculations to entertain the learned and meta- 
physical world, yet in other things I do not think so 
differently from the rest of the world as you imagine.’t 

A great number of arguments have been framed to 
prove the existence of God, but only two will be ex- 
amined in this chapter: (1) That which maintains that 
the universe is an effect for which no efficient First 
Cause can be conceived except God; (2) That which 
maintains that the marks of order and adaptation 
which abound in nature declare the existence of a 
Designer. The argument which is drawn from man’s 
moral nature to prove the existence of a Moral Ruler 
is reserved for separate consideration in connection 
with the mystery of evil. For other important and 
converging lines of evidence, the reader must be re- 


* ‘Three Essays on Religion,’ p. 174. 
+ Burton’s ‘ Life of Hume,’ Vol. I., p. 244. 


a ey pene 


LT hetsm. Gh 


ferred to works more exclusively devoted to this sub- 
aeGe 

Theists sometimes lay it down as an axiom that 
everything which exists must have had a cause; and 
thence draw the inference, ‘therefore there must have 
been a First Cause, z.c., God.’ But such an argument 
proves too much, as Atheists are not slow to see. 
They rejoin, ‘Then if God exists, He too must have 
had a cause, and so on ad infinitum ; for a First Cause 
contradicts the axiom laid:down.’ But the supposed 
axiom is not an axiom at all, as Mill rightly observes. 
It is not true that the human mind demands a cause 
for everything. On the contrary, it can find no rest 
until it discovers, or seems to discover, some self- 
existent thing or Person sufficient to account for all 
else that is. This discovery has been the main object 
of philosophy from the time of Thales until now. We 
only insist on asking for a cause when observing things 
that have evidently had a beginning, and might con- 
ceivably never have come into existence. When wit- 
nessing a change in nature, we ask what has caused 
it. But this only shows that we are irresistibly con- 
vinced that things do not alter or move unless some- 
thing is at work to alter them. 

Hume’s contention, that causation is only invariable 
sequence, need not detain us. There is some ground 
for supposing that he himself only regarded it as the 
reductio ad absurdum of Locke’s empiricism; and Mill, 
though sustaining it on abstract grounds, abandons it 
as a profitless distinction. If valid, it would be more 
fatal to science than to religion, because it would show 
that every attempt to connect a movement in the 


78 The Mystery of God. 


physical world with its cause involves an act of 
daith. 

We have already seen that Mr. H. Spencer recog- 
nises the existence of some ‘Cause which transcends 


our knowledge and conception,’ and is itself ‘ without — 


beginning or end.’ Mill makes the same admission, 
but in a more guarded form, and advances various 
considerations which greatly obscure the road to that 
conclusion for his readers, and which, therefore, need 
examination. He affirms, ‘ There is in Nature a per- 
manent element, and alsoachangeable: the changes are 
always the effects of previous changes; the permanent 
existences, so far as we know, are not effects at all.’* 
Notice well that expression, ‘ all changes are the results 
of previous changes;’ 7.c., every effect must have had 
a cause, and yet every cause must have been an effect ! 
Here, then, he so defines causation as to involve an 
infinite series of dependent and derived changes. 

But, having given this definition, he cannot be 
satisfied with it, and is well aware that the human 
mind never can be content with what is as absurd 
as the old Hindoo myth, that the world rests on an 
elephant, the elephant stands on a tortoise, and the 
tortoise stands on something else, and so on. In 
the same sentence, however, the writer postulates ‘a 
permanent element in nature.’ In so doing, he violates 
his whole system of philosophy, but he cannot help 
that. When asked what that permanent element is, 
he can only reply, it is ‘the specific elementary sub- 
stance or substances of which it consists and their 
inherent properties.’ Here, then, is a philosopher 


* “Three Essays on Religion,’ p. 142. 


b 
iy 
\ 
J ’ 
‘ 
he 
Nude 


ae 


Pom | att a br ee Te hoe 


Theiwsm. 79 


who protests we only know phenomena, going behind 
the scenes to affirm that something really underlies 
them, and that it is permanent, and has properties! 
This, however, is not all we are said to know. ‘These’ 
(substances, etc.) ‘are not known to us as beginning to 
exist ; within the range of human knowledge they had 
no beginning, consequently no cause, though they them- 
selves are causes or con-causes of everything that takes 
place.’ Surely this is not very lucid! In one para- 
graph we are told that ‘ changes are always the effects 
of previous changes,’ and then directly afterwards all 
these changes are traced up to an unchanging ‘ per- 
manent element’! What would Mill have said about 
a village preacher who ventured to talk like that ? 

But perhaps Mill can tell us a little more about this 
permanent element in nature. In the next paragraph 
he slides the word ‘ material’ into use as an equivalent 
for ‘permanent existences’ or substances in nature. 
It is an unpardonable sin in a logician, but let it 
pass. In this paragraph he proceeds to ‘analyze more 
closely the nature of the causes of which mankind 
have experience’ (p. 144). ‘ Whenever,’ he writes, ‘a 
physical phenomenon is traced to its cause, that cause 
when analyzed is found to be a certain quantity of 
Force combined with certain collocations.’ Let it be 
carefully noticed that all observed causes are said to 
consist of two things, ‘ force’ and ‘collocation.’ Now, 
collocation means either the act of placing, or the state 
of being placed, or placed with something. else. All 
causes, therefore, consist, according to Mill, of force 
and substance, considered as divided in many parts, 
and the arrangement of these parts in space. Having 


80 The Mystery of God. 


thus declared that all known causes contain these three 
things, he proceeds to say: ‘The last great generaliza- 
tion of science, the conservation of Force, teaches us 
that the variety in the effects depends partly upon the 
amount of the force, and partly upon the diversity of 
the collocations. The force is essentially one and the 
same, and there exists of it in nature a fixed quantity, 
which (if the theory be true) is never increased or 
diminished. Here, then, we find, even in the changes 
of material nature, a permanent element, to all appear- 
ance the very one of which we were in quest. This it 
is, apparently, to which, if to anything, we must assign 
the character of First Cause—the cause of the material 
universe’ (p. 145). 

Let us carefully analyze this piece of logic. All 
causes known to us consist of at least three things; 
Force, substances (supposed by Mill to be material), 
and the collocation of those substances; yet somehow 
out of this necessary trinity of causes we are asked, 
without a word of explanation, to believe that one 
alone—viz., Force—is the cause of the other two, and 
so through them the sole cause of the material uni- 
verse! Broadly viewed, this is very startling, and to 
sceptical minds quite incredible. But let us do it the 
homage of a closer inspection. Force, we are told, is 
one and the same in amount in nature, yet the amount 
of Force present in particular causations varies. If 
this be so, we want to know why the amount varies? 
what causes it to vary? Is it due to ‘the diversity of 
collocations?’ If so, we go on to ask, ‘ What causes 
the diversity of collocations? Is it Force? Yes, it 
must be Force, for this is the First Cause. But we 


Thetsm. St 


have already been told that only variable amounts of 
Force can vary the collocations, and so ask again, what © 
causes the amounts to vary? Thus we get on to a 
logical seesaw. Each end moves the other end, yet 
neither can start of itself. Each cause is prior to the 
other, and yet one is labelled First! To account for 
the material universe, Mill has, therefore, most con- 
clusively proved against himself that even if matter 
and force are eternal, as he is pleased to assume, reason, 
guided by experience, can find no rest until it discovers 
a Power capable of so starting and adjusting Force as 
to produce diversified collocations of matter. 

The question to which we are now brought is this: 
Have we any knowledge or experience of any sort of 
power which may be thought to indicate the nature of 
such an efficient First Cause? The only thing at all’ 
answering to this requirement is the human will. Let 
us see what help there is for us here.* Imagine the 
case of a philosopher who, while gravely walking down 
the street, feels a sudden sensation of pain in his head, 
as if froma severe blow. Immediately after, he hears 
a stone fall on the pavement at his feet, and sees it 
roll away into the gutter. Even David Hume would 
not hesitate to say, ‘ That stone struck me,’ particularly 

* T have not thought it necessary to trouble the reader with any 
discussion of the freedom of the will. The argument in the text 
does not depend for its validity on any theory as to the manner in 
which volition is determined. Mill candidly admits, ‘We have 
nothing to do here with the freedom of the will itself as a mental 
phenomenon—with the vexata guestio whether volition is self-de- 
termining or determined by causes. To the question now in hand 
it is only the effects of volition that are relevant, not its origin’ 


(p. 149). 
6 


82 The Mystery of God. 


if he found it stained with fresh warm blood like that 
‘streaming from his own cranium. But then that stone 
could not have come into that peculiar ‘ collocation’ 
with his head unless set in motion by some force. It 
did not fall from the skies ; there isno cause up yonder 
to account for its descent. But see! there runs a boy 
round the corner. ‘He threw it!’ cries a bystander. 
The philosopher believes this witness, and goes in chase 
of the culprit, mindless of any theory about free-will, 
or molecular forces, or the value of human testimony. 
Now, we can see that the said philosopher, when he 
began to run, was provoked by a physical antecedent, 
and yet the blow did not physically cause him to run. 
There is a mystery in this which might detain us; but 
let us rather think of the boy, and ask how the stone 
came flying. The boy’s hand picked it up, whirled it 
in the air, and imparted momentum to it. His hand 
is a mechanical contrivance, which was moved by 
sundry muscles, and they were governed by nerves, 
and these were connected with the brain, and received 
their impulsion from—what? It is all mechanical up 
to this point, just as the universe seems to be me- 
chanical until we get where Mill stranded us, crying out 
for a first Master of the Forces. We can trace that 
boy’s nerves to cells in the brain, and out of those cells 
there came, O! mystery of mysteries! an entirely new 
train of physical sequences. But that cell is our 
physical terminus. In that tiny chamber we are like 
Pompey when he penetrated the Holy of Holies in the 
Jewish temple, and said, ‘ These people have no God,’ 
because to his eyes it was vacant. Arrived at that cell, 
we are like all modern philosophers when their thoughts 


7 hewsm. 83 


pass behind the veil of the last visible phenomena of the 
universe. Science, by killing the boy and lending a 
microscope, can show us his brain-cells, but it can show 
nothing to explain their peculiar function. We can 
only return for further light into our own personal 
consciousness, and so doing, no one will hesitate to 
say, ‘There must be in that boy a thinking mind, an 
intelligent conscious life, which wills and uses his body 
as an instrument; just as I am conscious that I myself 
am in my body, which is not me but mine, and which 
I feel myself responsible for using wisely and_kindly in 
the world.’ Our conclusion, therefore, is the same as 
the philosopher’s as he runs in chase. We are quite 
sure that some waggish ‘or spiteful thought led that 
urchin to will; and that imperceptible will—known to 
him by consciousness, and known to us as an irresistible 
inference from the facts of experience and observation 
—that will directed the nerves, which stirred the 
muscles, which moved the bony skeleton of the arm, 
which sent the stone flying, and so caused that inert 
bit of matter to do a philosopher an injury, which may 
perhaps spoil the logic of an article on * science and 
religion’ which he is preparing for some review next 
month. 

It seems reasonable to suppose that we have now 
discovered what we were in search of, namely, some 
sort of power known to us by experience, which may 
be thought to indicate the nature of an efficient First 
Cause. What objections then can be urged against 
the supposition? Mill has only two demurs, and con- 
fesses that if these are answered the argument is 
good. 
6—2 


84 The Mystery of God. 


His first objection is, that Will as known to us does 
not create Force, but only employs the force which 
already exists in a latent or potential condition. We 
can well afford to make the concession demanded. 
Let it be granted then, that the human Will can only 
use existing stores of Energy, or, keeping to Mill’s 
own language, of Force. That is precisely the power 
we are inquiring after. Such a will would suffice to 
give us those ‘diversified collocations * of matter, and 
those various ‘amounts’ of Force, which are required to 
produce all the changes and events comprised in the 
‘cosmos, or order of the universe.’ This is all the 
present argument requires us to discover. Theorists 
say, ‘Give us Matter and Force, and we will explain 
the universe. We first of all reply that these stu- 
pendous gifts are not in our power to bestow. If any 
man can find them, he is welcome to them, although at 
present they are assumptions, not demonstrated exist- 
ences. For the sake of more clearly exposing the 
weakness of their boast, however, we make these bold 
mendicants a logical loan of ‘Matter and Force, and 
say, ‘Now explain the universe.’ Thus generously 
treated, it immediately transpires that they cannot get 
their Force to stir their Matter, or their Matter to col- 
locate itself without being stirred. Coming to their 
aid, we say, ‘Will could employ your Force, and 
thereby adjust your Matter.’ Clearly, then, it is as 
ungrateful as it is unreasonable to reply, ‘ But Will can 
only employ existing Force’! Mill’s first objection, 
therefore, is no objection at all, and unless the second 
proves more real, the case, by his own admission, is 
closed. 


Thersm. 85 


The second objection is, that ‘all the power that 
Will possesses over phenomena is shared, as far as we 
have the means of judging, by other and much more 
powerful agents ’ (p. 149). These other agents are said © 
to be ‘chemical action; for instance, electricity, heat, 
the mere presence of a gravitating body.’ There is at 
least courage in this assertion. Did any chemist ever 
Gnd his materials develop spontaneous and eccentric 
activities, such as we have seen emerging from a youth 
of wilful disposition? Is he ever thwarted in his ex- 
periments by waggish and incalculable proceedings on 
the part of his gases, so that he is driven to say 
‘There is some volitional sprite hidden in this retort, 
and it is serving me trickslike a boy?’ Do electricians 
ever find tokens of free agency in their batteries? Do 
astronomers tell us of vagaries or lack of gravity among 
the stars? Does a planet ever run for a change into 
another solar system, or Jupiter, complaining of being 
cold, select an orbit nearer to the sun? No; all the 
agents mentioned by Mill are well known to be mere 
names for ascertained modes of motion, and they always 
operate in acertain and undeviating order. Chemical, 
electrical, and dynamical sciences are only possible 
because these changes are regular and fixed. How, 
then, can it be said that these agents share ‘all the 
power that Will possesses over phenomena’? Man’s 
will can tame and utilize these agents, although so 
‘much more powerful’ than himself. The chemist is 
able to produce many startling effects which unguided 
Force would never evolve. The electrician enables us 
to converse with men through the Atlantic, and illu- 
mines cities and palaces, so that the night shines about 


/ 


86 The Mystery of God. 


us as the day. If Mill had waited for chemical agents 
to produce ink of their own accord, or for electricity to 
shape a pen, or for gravitating bodies to do the work of 
the printing-press, that ‘ Essay on Theism’ would never 
have been published. ‘The power that the Will pos- 
sesses over phenomena is’ not ‘shared, as far as we 
have the means of judging,’ by any other agents; and 
this branch of our discussion may fitly be closed by 
the quotation of a few words with which Mill prefaced 
the remarkable passage now criticised: ‘If it be true 
that Will can originate, not indeed Force, but the 
transformation of Force from some other of its mani- 
festations into that of mechanical motion, and that 
there is within human experience no other agency 
capable of doing so, the argument for a Will as the 
originator, though not of the universe, yet of the 
cosmos, or order of the universe, remains unanswered ’ 
(p. 148). 

When the foundations are removed, it is superfluous, 
generally speaking, to demolish the superstructure. 
The remainder.of Mill’s ‘Essay on Theism’ is vitiated 
by the assumption that he has made good the positions 
now shown to be untenable. If Will be proved the 
only thinkable cause of motion and order in the cosmos, 
it carries Mind with it, because volition is admitted to 
be one of the three great mental phenomena, namely : 
intelligence, emotion, and volition. There is no need 
to cumber this discussion with any theory of what 
‘mind-stuff’ is, but it may be desirable to criticise 
Mill’s argument to prove that a thinking mind might 
originally have been produced by unconscious matter. 
His sole reliance is on the analogy of Nature, which he 


Thetsm. 87 


declares abounds with facts to prove that ‘causes can 
give rise to products of a more precious or elevated 
kind than themselves’ (p. 152). If science can furnish 
these facts we must consider their significance. But — 
where are they to be found? Mill points to one very 
wide class of phenomena, a class as wide indeed as the 
animal and vegetable kingdoms together, and on this 
he triumphantly rests his case, and esteems it won. 
Consider attentively, then, his facts. ‘How vastly 
nobler and more precious, for instance, are the higher 
vegetables and animals, than the soil and manure out 
of which, and by which, and by the properties of which, 
they are raised up!’ (p. 152). It might be unkind to 
ask what ‘soil’ is made of, and to be very curious about 
‘manures’; but be it known, for the benefit of de- 
pressed agriculturists and bewildered cattle-breeders 
in these hard times, that they only need ‘soil and 
manure’ to produce the precious corn, fruit trees, 
sheep, and oxen, which in their ignorance they have 
been accustomed to propagate in a costly manner 
from previous specimens of their respective kinds! 
If our harassed fellow-citizens will take a note of this, 
the farming interests will immediately revive, and 
when privileged to see the plentiful products of this 
economical process, we will with one accord admit that 
not only are animals and vegetables, but that man’s 
mind also is the product of ‘soil and manure,’ and not 
of a Living and Wise God. 

So far, we have seen reasons for holding that a First 
Cause is a necessity of thought, and that to account 
for the facts of the universe that First Cause must 
possess Power and Will. Our last thoughts lead us to 


88 Lhe Mystery of God. 


a further proposition, viz., That the First Cause must 
have been possessed of Wisdom. This brings us to 
what is popularly known as the argument from Design 
in Nature, but is more accurately stated as an argument 
from marks of adaptation and order to a Designer. 
This argument fell out of use fora time: but Science 
is every day supplying new illustrations of its cogency, 
and even the language of Darwin has no meaning 
unless Nature is the work of One who adapts means to 
ends with foresight and wisdom. 

To state this argument aright would require a survey 
of the Universe. There is nothing unreasonable in 
nature when sufficiently examined. All things have 
their use, and many things are useful to other things in 
the most remote parts of space, and through measure- 
less cycles of time. The gas-light which illumines our 
houses and streets is due to the energy of the sun 
millions of miles away, and millions of years ago. The 
soil in which we sow our seeds is able to nourish them 
because enriched through millenniums of apparently 
wasted life and useless death. ‘The heavens no longer 
declare the glory of God,’ exclaimed an Atheist, ‘ but 
the glory of Hipparchus, Kepler and Newton.’ Yet 
unimaginable ages before man entered this little infant- 
school we call our world, the stars were rushing in their 
spheres, globe circling round globe, system whirling 
round system with faultless truth, so that astronomical 
days, and weeks, and years, made up of thousands like 
our own, are marked with an exactitude no chrono- 
meters approach. Before a mathematician began to 
calculate the universe was constructed on principles so 
perfect that man’s most marvellous science is merely 


Lheism. 89 


their discovery; and so complex that the skill of those 
half-dozen men who stand alone in their mathematical 
attainments is confessedly incompetent to resolve some 
of the most elementary problems they present. Is 
it conceivable then that no mind was engaged in the 
production of this which only mind can contemplate 
and admire? Is it reasonable to suppose that we late- 
comers on this insignificant planet are the wisest beings 
in the universe? Had these wonders never been 
surveyed until men made telescopes? Is there no one 
mind to whom the general order is known in its unity 
and vastness? Great is the credulity of those who can 
presume to say ‘No’ to these questions. 

It would greatly add to the interest and impressive- 
ness of the argument to consider some of the special 
adaptations which abound in nature. The human eye 
viewed in conjunction with the phenomena of light and 
the great luminaries in the distant heavens might 
furnish materials for volumes. Every organ in man’s” 
body is a marvel that might repay a lifetime spent in 
study. Every animal that exists is a mystery of skill, 
and every plant that grows asign and wonder. Our 
object, however, would not be gained if we culled some 
fascinating beauties of modern discovery, and said, 
‘ Behold the marks of a Divine Artificer!’ Presuming 
that the reader is acquainted with such facts, our little 
remaining space must be devoted to the more prosaic 
task of answering some objections which are urged 
against the Theistic inference. 

It is objected by Mill to this pene that it proves 
the Designer to be the Former, not the Creator of the 
substance of the universe. The reply is obvious. It 


90 Lhe Mystery of God. 


was not intended to prove more. The Theist, whether 
Christian or not, is not called upon to deny the eternity 
of matter. ‘By faith we understand that the worlds 
have been framed by the word of God, so that what is 
seen hath not been made out of things that do appear” 
(Heb. xi. 3). This is all that Theism is obliged to 
assert, and all that Christians are called upon by their 
Scriptures to believe. 

Again, Mill urges that this argument does not prove 
the Maker of the universe Infinite. Perhaps not. It 
can only logically prove the Maker to be capable of 
making the universe which has been made, and that is 
all we want. If anyone can define and delimit the 
universe, he may then proceed to delimit its Maker. 
When the first work has been accomplished, we will, 
if alive, discuss the second. Meanwhile our knowledge 
of the universe is, as Carlisle said, something like the 
knowledge of the ocean possessed by a minnow in his 
native creek. The universe itself is infinite to our 
minds, but given a Being capable of producing even 
what is known, an attempt to set bounds to His Wisdom 
and Power would scarcely be a mark of sagacity. 

A third objection is more extraordinary. Mill affirms 
that marks of Design are a proof of weakness in their 
maker. He writes: ‘It is not too much to say that 
every indication of design in the cosmos is so much 
evidence against the Omnipotence of the Designer. 
For what is meant by Design? Contrivance: the 
adaptation of means to an end. But the necessity for 
contrivance—the need of employing means—is a con- 
sequence of the limitation of power. Who would have 
recourse to means if to attain his end his mere word 


Theis. QI 


was sufficient ? The very idea of means implies that 
the means have an efficacy which the direct action of 
the being who employs them has not. Otherwise they 
are not means, but an incumbrance. A man does not 
use machinery to move his arms. If he did, it could 
only be when paralysis had deprived him of the power 
of moving them by volition. But if the employment of 
contrivance is in itself a sign of limited power, how 
much more so is the careful and skilful choice of 
contrivances? Can any wisdom be shown in the use 
of means, when the means have no efficacy but what 
is given them by the will of him who employs them, 
and when his will could have bestowed the same 
efficacy on any other means? Wisdom and con- 
trivances are shown in overcoming difficulties, and 
there is no room for them in a Being for whom no 
difficulties exist’ (p. 177). 

It is somewhat difficult to criticise with seriousness 
such ingenious trifling. No Theist supposes that God 
resorted to the use of machinery for the production of 
the universe, nor does the argument from the pheno- 
mena of adaptation suggest, much less imply, that He 
did. The Scriptures state that all things were framed 
by the word of God, and in this connection ‘ word’ is a 
picturesque synonym for will. ‘He spake, and it was 
done.’ This is our theory. Now suppose that a man 
were able to produce a steam-engine by merely willing 
it to appear, would the presence in that machine of 
‘contrivances,’ and the adaptation of its several parts 
to one another, and of a!l together to some useful 
purpose, be an indication that ‘ means’ were employed 
in its construction? Or suppose that he were able 


92 Lhe Mystery of God. 


to produce a human eye by the energy of his will, 
- would that indicate that he needed that eye as an 
organ of sight? If God had needed to contrive an 
eye for Himself to see with, or a telescope to survey - 
His remote dominions, that would have proved Him 
finite and defective, just as a need for spectacles 
proves men. But then Theism says that eyes were 
made because it pleased God to create seeing creatures 
in correspondence with a glorious universe, which was 
also created for them to behold and take pleasure 
therein. The contrivances and the objects they sub- 
serve are alike a part of the design. Without such 
adaptation of finite parts to finite uses there would 
have been no universe. If Science should ever come 
upon some store of ancient implements which were | 
evidently those used by the Creator in fashioning 
the world, then it might be urged that God had to 
employ machinery to effect His creative task. It is, 
however, the absence of all such traces of a living 
workman which renders so many sceptical about the 
universe being ‘God’s handiwork.’ They can see no 
tools, They can see no hand to wield such things. 
Hence they say, ‘All things came of themselves.’ If 
God made the universe, as Theists believe, He certainly 
did it without tools. If Mill’s argument, therefore, 
means anything, it means that creation is itself a sign 
of weakness! Such a plea may be left to itself. 
Another objection to the argument from visible 
adaptation to the existence of a designing mind has 
been stated by Professor Huxley in a celebrated and 
often-echoed passage, which occurs in his reply to 
sundry criticisms on ‘The Origin of Species.’ ‘It is 


Thezisne. 93 
singular,’ he remarks, ‘how differently one and the 
same book will impress different minds. That which 
struck the present writer on his first perusal of the 
‘* Origin of Species ” was the conviction that Teleology 
as commonly understood had received its death-blow at 
Mr. Darwin’s hand. For the Teleological argument 
runs thus: An organ or organism (a) is precisely fitted 
to perform a function or purpose (b); therefore it was 
specially constructed to perform that function. In 
Paley’s famous illustration, the adaptation of all the 
parts of the watch to the function, or purpose, of show- 
ing the time, is held to be evidence that the watch was 
specially contrived to that end, on the ground that the 
only cause we know of competent to produce such an 
effect as a watch which shall keep time is a contriving 
intelligence adapting the means directly to that end. 
Suppose, however, that anyone had been able to show 
that the watch had not been made directly by any 
person, but that it was the result of the modification 
of another watch which kept time but poorly; and 
that this, again, had proceeded from a structure which 
could hardly be called a watch at all, seeing that it had 
no figures on the dial, and the hands were rudimentary ; 
and that going back and back in time we came at last 
to a revolving barrel as the earliest traceable rudiment 
of the whole fabric ; and imagine that it had been pos- 
sible to show that all these changes had resulted, first, 
from a tendency of the structure to vary indefinitely, 
and secondly, from something in the surrounding world 
which helped all variations in the direction of an accu- 
rate time-keeper, and checked all those in other direc- 
tions; then it is obvious that the force of Paley’s 


94 The Mystery of God. 


argument would be gone. For it would be demon- 
strated that an apparatus thoroughly well adapted to 
a particular purpose might be the result of a method 
of trial and error worked by unintelligent agents, as 
well as of the direct application of the means appro- 
priate to that end by an intelligent agent. Now, it 
appears to us that what we have here, for illustration’s 
sake, supposed to be done with the watch, is exactly 
what the establishment of Darwin’s theory will do for 
the organic world.’* 

It is indeed ‘singular how differently one and the 
same book will impress different minds ;’ eg., it is 
rather remarkable how any acute person could read 
the passage just quoted without being impressed with 
its inconsequence. The extravagant exercise of that 
most unscientific faculty, the imagination, carries its 
own refutation in every line. We simply cannot con- 
ceive what we are asked to suppose; and when a theory 
requires for its illustration the invention of an un- 
thinkable process, it must be in a bad case. Paley’s 
argument is that, so far as our experience extends, 
mechanical adaptations to useful ends are always the 
product of thinking minds; and this no one disputes. 
Therefore, he reasons, we are constrained to believe 
that Nature, which abounds in mechanism, must be the 
work of a wise Designer. Professor Huxley’s argument 
is, that if something could be proved to have happened 
that we know never did occur, and never can occur, 
then we should have within our experience a parallel 
to his theory of Nature. Which of these two argu- 
ments is the more philosophic needs no pointing out. 

© Lay Sermons,’ pp. 330, 331. 


Theism. 95 


But let us carry this argument another stage. Should 
it ever be proved that the universe has grown out of 
collocated: molecules which possess the power and 
potency thus revealed, it will only make the argument 
from order and adaptation more cogent. It is a great 
triumph of human skill to make a watch; but still 
thousands of men can do it. But how much more 
wonderful would it be to contrive a watch which could 
reproduce itself, and whose progeny would go on im- 
proving through many generations, until each watch 
showed upon its dial-plate the time in every earthly 
longitude and latitude, and the cycles of all the planets, 
and presently of all the stars! But if this were mar- 
vellous, how much more so to produce a ‘revolving 
barrel,’ which by dint of much revolving could at last 
evolve such a reproductive and ever-improving genera- 
tion of watches, and a host.of other reproductive 
machines as well! Yet one stage more. How still 
more marvellous—yes, how truly miraculous—it would 
be to produce a material, which of itself could produce 
a barrel, which could bring forth such a magnificent 
series of effects! What is the making of a watch, or 
of a million different machines, in comparison with the 
production of atoms of such potency as the evolution 
theory postulates ?—such potency that, once collocated 
and set in motion, not only watches, but watch-makers 
and mathematicians, Paleys, Huxleys, Newtons, and 
Shakespeares, spontaneously come forth |* 


** Since writing the above, I have seen it stated that Professor 
Huxley has admitted the fallacy of his illustration, and of the 
argument it was elaborated to sustain. I have not met with his 
actual words, but gladly append this note in confirmation of what 

is written, and injustice to him. I have not omitted the quotation 


95 The Mystery of God. 


The propositions supported in this chapter may now 
‘be summarised. That metaphysical objections to the 
Theistic idea of a Personal God are not such as can 
be sustained, and are for the most part gratuitous 
assumption. That the so-called anthropomorphism 
of Theism is, when rightly viewed, its commendation, 
not its condemnation. That the facts of the universe 
point unmistakably to a self-existent First Cause. That 
the facts of consciousness and the observed order of 
nature indicate that this First Cause must be possessed 
of the attributes Wisdom and Volition, which can only 
belong toa Living God. In order to test these pro- 
positions, we have reviewed the strongest arguments 
advanced against them by the most honoured men who 
have criticised the Theistic belief. If they emerge 
from the ordeal unscathed by the powerful attacks to 
which they have been subjected, it is tolerably evident 
that the fire which is to burn up faith in the Living God 
has not yet been kindled on the earth. 


and its examination, however, because the passage is still read by 
thousands who know nothing of the disclaimer, and also because 
it represents a line of argument which has been extensively adopted 
by many writers and speakers of less note. The fact that such 
an argument should ever have appeared satisfactory to Mr. Huxley’s 
mind is surely a signal warning to admirers of his teachings, 


CHAPTER IV. 
THE STRAITS OF THEISM WITHOUT REVELATION. 


We have now advanced to a point in our investigations 
where believers in God begin to separate. Standing on 
the verge of the unseen and eternal, they ditfer in their 
mental attitude towards that which lies behind the veil, 
and in their opinions as to the kind and degree of know- 
ledge which may be had of God. They agree in confess- 
ing that the Great First Cause cannot be perceived in 
the same manner as phenomena, and also in affirming, 
as against Agnostics, that some things may be known 
respecting Him because clearly manifested in the effects 
observable in Nature, and experienced in our conscious 
life. But here their agreement terminates. Jews, 
Christians, and Mohammedans go beyond this, and say 
that God has spoken to men ‘by divers portions and in 
divers manners.’ All three affirm that He thus com- 
municated a special knowledge of His mind and will 
to the Patriarchs, and to Moses and the Prophets. 
Christians add that this revelation culminated in the 
person of Jesus Christ. Mohammedans, while deeming 
Jesus a teacher sent from God, revere the Prophet of 
Mecca as the bearer to mankind of the latest and most 
precious disclosure of the Divine will. Beyond these 
there are Theists who reject all alleged revelations, 
7 


98 The Mystery of God. 


asserting, like the Deists before them, that whatever 
- is true in the three great monotheistic religions may be 
ascertained and justified by the human reason working in 
the light of Nature. They limit the action of God toan 
original causation, insisting thatany subsequent interpo- 
sition of His will would amount to a confession of defect 
in the system created, or to a change of mind in the 
Creator, which would imply defect in Himself. A 
miracle means in their judgment the correction of a 
fault in the thing constructed ; just as clocks only need 
repair and regulation because their makers are unable to 
endow them, like Nature, with powers of self-adjustment 
and recuperation. They insist that the universe came 
forth from the creative hand in germ, and has been 
evolved without the need for being touched, modified, or 
added to by its Author. Christianity they repudiate for 
various reasons, but primarily because it is confessedly a 
remedial scheme, and is thus supposed to impugn the 
perfection of the Creator’s work. They also contend 
that any conceivable revelation would constitute a 
breach of that continuity which natural science declares 
is not only a law of Nature, but the law of all natural 
laws, the ultimate basis of the very notion of law itself. 

These views will not be endorsed in their entirety by 
all who class themselves among Theists. Not a few 
attempt to reconcile a belief in the constant activity of 
God and His ceaseless communion with human souls, 
with a denial of everything miraculous in revelation. 
Some of these desire to be included among Christians 
because revering Christ as the foremost among the 
sons of men, the highest type of moral excellence, and 
the most inspiring example we can select for imitation. 


The Straits of Theism without Revelation. 99 


They love God as their Father and worship Him as 
they think Christ inculcated. I have no wish to at- 
tenuate their creed by confounding them with the more 
logical but less religious Theists just described. Whether — 
they occupy a tenable position will be considered here- 
after. But to whatever extent their ideas are fairly 
resolvable into a denial of a Divine revelation to man 
_ of truths not discoverable by the unaided reason, their 
logical, if not their admitted, position is beset with 
all the difficulties now to be advanced. The purpose 
of this chapter, however, is not to discuss any objections 
urged against revelation in general and Christianity in 
particular, but to try as a previous question whether 
Theism is able to justify its faith in an infinitely good 
and wise God, while repudiating all professed com- 
munications from Him to mankind. 

The statement of this question exhibits the extreme 
inconvenience of using the word ‘ Theist’ to designate a 
section, or several small sections of those who believe in 
a Personal God. The great strife of our age is between 
Theism and Atheism, and the former name cannot be 
spared for the narrow purpose of a denominational title. 
There is no other word which can replace it asa generic 
term, seeing that Deism is historically wedded to Anti- 
Christian opinions, and cannot now be revived in a 
broader sense. With every wish therefore to show 
courtesy, and to speak of men by the names they prefer, 
it is impossible to do so in this case without causing 
great confusion of thought. To prefix some qualifying 
term such as ‘ Bare,’ or ‘ Mere,’ or ‘ Pure,’ whenever 
the word Theism is used in a restricted sense, is objec- 
tionable. Of these adjectives, which have all been used 

7—2 


100 The Mystery of God. 


for the purpose, the two former seem contemptuous, 
‘while the last appears to admit that Christianity is only 
an impure form of Theism. For the purposes of 
brevity and clearness I shall therefore employ the term 
Deism in this chapter to denote the theory under 
review, reserving Theism for that wider use which in- 
cludes every form of belief in a Personal God. 

No theory of the universe can hold its ground against 
Atheistic Pessimism which fails to reconcile the preva- 
lence of pain and moral evil with the Creator’s good- 
ness. Paul wrote, ‘ We know that the whole creation 
groaneth,’ and Atheists echo mockingly, ‘The whole 
creation groaneth.’ Deism generally tries to minimise 
the facts of human misery, and of Nature’s travail, but, 
however reduced, they remain an appalling spectacle. 
Christians hold doctrines which propose a solution of 
the problem, while Atheists say that no conceivable 
explanation can be satisfactory. For a moment, there- 
fore, Atheists and Christians stand side by side, the 
one party with derisive laughter, the other with sympa- 
thetic grief, to remark the straits into which the Deist 
is driven when attempting to vindicate the ways of 
God. 

Our attention must first be directed to the mystery 
of pain. The more light we get from physical sources, 
the wider we perceive to be the kingdom in which pain 
has reigned. The earth’s crust is one vast sepulchre 
of perished animals, most of which endured and in- 
flicted pain. Man’s own life from the birth-cry to the 
death-throe is haunted by pain. Can this declare, or 
even be reconciled with, the Creator’s goodness ? 

An impartial student of Nature may no doubt arrive 


The Straits of Thetsm without Revelation, 101 


at Paley’s conclusion, that there is a preponderance of 
pleasure over pain ; but this does not account for so 
vast a remainder in the other scale, nor does it explain 
the obvious fact that it is most unequally distributed. 
It may be observed that pain operates in various bene- 
ficial ways, and is not inflicted, as we might expect it 
would be, by one who finds pleasure in the sight of 
anguish. Pain seems to be a safeguard of all vital 
organisms, warning of danger, and often enforcing a 
cessation of self-destructive actions. So fateedse the 
animals are concerned there are good reasons for 
believing that they suffer immeasurably less than we 
are apt toimagine. In many cases of apparent anguish, 
sensation is probably suspended. Their pains, more- 
over, are only isolated sensations, and, therefore, not 
comparable with those which man’s moral and intel- 
lectual faculties connect with his past and future 
history. It is also noticeable that as our nervous 
system is constituted, pain is the inseparable con- 
comitant of pleasure, the very susceptibility to pleasant 
sensations carrying with it the possibility of being 
affected too strongly, or in unsuitable ways. Dr. Mauds- 
ley seems also to think that pains are less easily 
recalled than pleasures ;* but I fear this is a mistake. 
Strictly speaking, no sensation can ever be recalled 
without the recurrence of a physical cause. But to 
whatever extent feelings can be remembered, most 
people will think that painfulness neither aids nor 
impedes _ their recollection. If, however, a Deist 
thinks Dr. Maudsley’s theory helps him a little, I shall 
not strive to take away that very reed-like crutch. But, 
® ‘The Physiology of Mind,’ pp. 537-3. 


102 The Mystery of God. | 


after all allowances have been made, what do these 
_ mitigations prove? They are to the Divine character, 
as impugned by Pessimism, only what extenuating 
circumstances are when pleaded in a criminal’s defence. 
They prove to most minds, though not to all, that the 
world was not made by a malicious fiend; but they 
are not sufficient to show that pain is consistent with 
the theory of creation by an all-powerful, all-wise, and 
perfectly good God. The Deists of the last century 
brought many objections against Christianity as incon- 
sistent with Divine benevolence, while insisting that 
the light of Nature was clear and unmistakable. 
Against that argument it was urged, with final and 
absolutely conclusive force by Butler, that there was 
no moral difficulty in the Christian revelation which 
was not to be found also in thesystem of Nature. He 
did not press that answer beyond the logical necessity 
of the controversy then in hand, or he might have 
proved those difficulties fatal to Deism. His book 
left Deism and Christianity weighted with analogous 
problems, and so, while closing one controversy, it 
cleared the ground for the more fundamental debates 
of our own time. Since his day the opinions of 
scientific men have undergone a great revolution, and 
the discoveries of geology have immensely added to 
the array of facts to be explained. As a specimen of 
the indictment which may be framed against that 
system of Nature which Deism regarded as so perfect, 
it may be well to quote a somewhat lengthy passage 
from J. S. Mill: 

‘In sober truth, nearly all the things which men 
are hanged or imprisoned for doing to one another are 


The Straits of Theis without Revelation. 103 


Nature’s every-day performances. Killing, the most 
criminal act recognised by human laws, Nature does 
once to every being that lives ; and, in a large pro- 
portion of cases, after protracted tortures such as only 
the greatest monsters whom we read of ever purposely 
inflicted on their living fellow-creatures...... 
Nature impales men, breaks them as if on the wheel, 
casts them to be devoured by wild beasts, burns them 
to death, crushes them with stones like the first 
Christian martyr, starves them with hunger, freezes 
them with cold, poisons them with the quick or slow 
venom of her exhalations, and has hundreds of other 
deaths in reserve, such as the ingenious cruelty of a 
Nabis or a Domitian never surpassed. All this Nature 
does with the most supercilious disregard both of 
mercy and justice, emptying her shafts upon the best 
and noblest indifferently with the meanest and worst ; 
upon those who are engaged in the highest and 
worthiest enterprises, and often as the direct conse- 
quence of the noblest acts, and, it might almost be 
imagined, as a punishment for them. She mows down 
those on whose existence hangs the well-being of a 
whole people, perhaps the prospect of the human race 
for generations to come, with as little compunction as 
those whose death is a relief to themselves, or a blessing 
to those under their noxious influence. Such are 
Nature’s dealings with life. Even when she does not 
intend to kill, she inflicts the same tortures in apparent 
wantonness...... Next to taking life (equal to it 
according to a high authority) is taking the means by 
which we live; and Nature does this, too, on the largest 
scale and with the most callous indifference. A single 


104 _ Lhe Mystery of God. 


hurricane destroys the hopes of a season; a flight of 
locusts, or an inundation, desolatesa district ; a trifling 
chemical change in an edible root starves a million of 
people. The waves of the sea, like banditti, seize and 
appropriate the wealth of the rich and the little all of 
the poor, with the same accompaniments of stripping, 
wounding, and killing as their human antitypes. Every- 
thing, in short, which the worst men commit against 
life or property is perpetrated on a larger scale by 
natural agents.’* 

Again—‘ Those who flatter themselves with the notion 
of reading the purposes of the Creator in His works, 
ought in consistency to have seen grounds for inferences 
from which they have shrunk. If there are any marks 
at all of special design in creation, one of the things 
most evidently designed is that a large proportion of all 
animals should pass their existence in tormenting and 
devouring other animals. They have been lavishly 
fitted out with the instruments necessary for that 
purpose; their strongest instincts impel them to it, 
and many of them seem to have been constructed in- 
capable of supporting themselves by any other food. 
If a tenth part of the pains which have been expended 
in finding benevolent adaptations in all nature had been 
employed in collecting evidence to blacken the character 
of the Creator, what scope for comment would not 
have been found in the entire existence of the lower 
animals, divided, with scarcely an exception, into 
devourers and devoured, and a prey to a thousand ills 
from which they are denied the faculties necessary for 
protecting themselves. If we are not obliged to believe 

* ¢Three Essays on Religion,’ p. 28. 


The Straits of Theism without Revelation. 105 


the animal creation to be the work of a demon, it is 
because we need not suppose it to have been made by 
a Being of infinite power’ (p. 58). 

This is a very terrible passage, and one which Mill 
has been severely blamed for writing; but from the 
standpoint of a mere observer of physical facts it is 
perfectly fair, and assuredly it is a passage no Theist 
can be allowed to overlook. For my own part, I have 
no wish to restrict the scope of what is called Natural 
Theology, or to diminish the force of any argument for 
the Divine benevolence; but I confess that, without 
appealing to the whole scheme of moral culture and 
redemption which is inseparably identified with the 
revelation of God in Christ, I can find no weapon with 
which to repel Mill’s attack. If pain and moral evil 
were connected by uniform workings of natural law, 
we might find refuge in that fact as an indication of 
creative goodness. But then, as Mill shows, and as 
the patriarch Job bewailed, that connection does not 
visibly exist. Voltaire wished to maintain the good- 
ness of God while scoffing at Revelation, yet in his 
Dialogue between two ‘ Worshippers of God’ the 
speakers differ only in the degree of their despondency. 


One of them exclaims: ‘The globe... . is a vast 
field of carnage and infection. .. . Man is the most 
miserable of all the animals together. . . . Take away 


a few sages, and the herd of human beings is nothing 
but a horrible assemblage of unfortunate criminals, and 
the globe contains nothing but corpses. I tremble to 
have to complain once more of the Being of beings, 
while casting a careful gaze over this terrible picture. J 
wish I had never been born.’ The Dialogue closes 


106 Lhe Mystery of God. 


with a confession from the more hopeful thinker that 
“we are in a tempest,’ and that if better days are to 
come he knows not where or when to look for them.* 

The light of Nature can never chase away this 
mystery of pain, for the alleged light is itself the dark- 
ness to be relieved. If God has not revealed Himself 
in a clearer and more satisfying way than Reason can 
read in the facts of the visible world, the Divine 
goodness must either be abandoned, or be clung to as 
a mere preference of the mind, because the alternative 
is too terrible to be entertained. 

But the existence of physical pain is a small thing in 
comparison with the existence of moral evil. It is 
easy for a Deist to echo the Atheist’s laugh at the 
doctrine of man’s fall from a state of innocency ; 
but having laughed his laugh, the facts are still on his 
hands. Suppose the book of Genesis gone, and all 
Paul’s letters to be treated as waste-paper, that only 
clears the ground for a more satisfactory explanation 
of the phenomena. In full view of the wickedness 
which festers visibly among the masses, and hides - 
behind the paint and tinsel of fashion in our most 
civilized cities, it requires some hardihood to say, ‘ All 
things are working out a perfect order and no Divine 
rectification is required.’ | 

The difficulty is not removed, as some suppose, by 
appealing from man’s character, which is bad, to man’s 
conscience, which discerns and condemns the badness. 
This discord only brings us into the heart of the 
mystery. Man is the highest of creatures on this 
earth, yet he alone comes short of his proper glory. 

* ‘Complete Works,’ Vol. VI., p. 714. (Paris Ed. 1837.) 


The Straits of Theism without Revelation. 107 


He alone bears the marks of violating, instead of ful- 
filling, his own nature. He alone has any strife about 
what to aim at, and what he may or may not do: and 
he alone has any sense of guilt or apprehension of judg- 
ment. Bya singular irony of fact, these feelings of self- 
dissatisfaction on account of moral failure are most 
intensely experienced where they seem least called for, 
and most mournfully expressed by advanced and 
reflective peoples, and by the most refined and elevated 
individuals among them. These feelings of being out 
of order, and somehow discrowned and thwarted in 
self-rule, are the outpourings of prophets and saints, 
philosophers and poets. It is only where either 
morality or intelligence has sunk to a low ebb that © 
they are feebly entertained. 

Whence come these sentiments? What explanation 
can be given of this schism in man’s nature? Why is 
it that man’s actual life is such a mockery of his inward 
hopes and convictions, and so utterly unable to afford 
him that contentment which reigns among the lower 
animals? Is all this the fulfilment of law, or the breach 
of it? Isit the orderly outworking of a perfect creation 
which needs no correction, or is it the strife of a being 
at variance with his Maker ? 

Tracing the mischief back in thought, it becomes 
evident that in any case there must have been a first 
time when a human being said within himself, respecting 
some contemplated act, ‘I ought not to do this thing,’ 
and yet did it against that conviction. Whether the 
story of Genesis be a literal history or a veiled account 
of what took place in another form, the inward history 
must have transpired. Whether man came up slowly 


108 Lhe Mystery of God. 


from a bestial state to the human, or was made a man 
at once by a new creation, is absolutely immaterial to 
this argument. It made no difference to a Roman 
criminal flung headlong from the Tarpeian Rock 
whether he first toiled up the sloping ascent or was 
carried to the summit by other hands. In either case 
the fall was the same. So the process by which man 
reached a state of moral reflectiveness would not alter 
the practical effect of a first disobedience to the sense 
of duty. Similarly, it makes no difference to the 
problem immediately before us, whether man received 
some oral command from a living Person clothed in a 
visible form, or was only possessed of an inward light. 
On-any conceivable supposition there was a time when 
man began to discern between evil and good, and when 
he chose the evil through some illusory idea of finding 
its fruit better than good. From that moment man 
would know what it is to be ashamed. By that one act 
of yielding to a transient desire against his reason, the 
force of passion would be increased, and self-control 
be diminished. From that ‘first acting’ of an un- 
approved thing, his mind would suffer ‘the nature of 
an insurrection,’ and by that one act what the Bible 
calls ‘sin’ came into the world. Let Materialists or 
Deists call it what they please, the act by any other 
name was Just as bad, and being done, would. bring 
about the history we see. Keep all theological terms 
out of sight. Dismiss ‘original sin’ to the limbo of 
obsolete terms. Bring forward the scientific doctrine 
of heredity, and the connection between the first and 
all subsequent wrongdoing is plain. An exact science 
will say that even physically man’s body, the tenement 


The Straits of Theism without Revelation. 109 


and implement of the will, must have been impaired. 
Habits of nerve action would be originated, more or less 
detrimental to the perfect sway of the will over its 
organized instruments; and whenever and wherever 
desire and conviction of duty might conflict, the effects 
of every previous folly would be felt in a diminished 
force of self-control. 

So far we must all go—Atheist, Deist, and Christian 
alike. Those who deny a Personal God are not called 
upon to say anything about this primal error under its 
moral aspect. For them it is simply an inevitable step 
in the evolution of mankind. Buta Deist cannot dis- 
- miss the matter thus lightly. He has been accustomed 
to flout the Bible as if Genesis had created its own 
difficulties ; but now Atheists and Christians await his 
interpretation of this mysterious stage of evolution. 
We require to be told whether this was an incident 
the Creator intended to take place or not. We ask 
the Deist : ‘ Was man, in disobeying his own “I ought 
not,” doing what he was created to do, or was he dis- 
obeying the will of God? Was it a part of the uni- 
versal harmony, or was it a jarring note of discord, a 
breach of the order God designed?’ If he replies: 
‘God intended it, and made man so that he could not 
help sinning,’ then where is God’s goodness ae Luethat 
case the Creator is by admission the direct Author of 
the moral confusion which entered into and still afflicts 
the world. 

But, repudiating this supposition, Deists will reply : 
‘No; God did not intend man to act against his sense 
of duty. That sense of duty was the voice of God to 
him, and it is so still.’ This is their answer. It is the 


110 Lhe Mystery of God. 


only one they can make without denying man’s moral 
nature altogether. But having made it, what becomes 
of their much-used argument against the Biblical idea 
of the fall? It is gone. They have admitted a first 
act of disobedience to the voice or will of God, and 
whatever the outer drapery of the story, the interior 
fact is precisely the same. How can this tremendous 
fact be said to reveal a Perfect God, whose creation 
needs no remedial touch and no forth-putting of His 
Personal Will? 

We may conduct these parties one more step 
together. They must both admit that God foresaw 
what would transpire when He brought man into being. 
Whatever moral difficulties may be really or apparently 
involved in that admission, they press on the Deist 
with as much weight as on the Christian. The only 
difference between them is that a Christian has a 
sublime theory of redemption to offer, which at any rate 
professes to reconcile God's foreknowledge of evil with 
His wisdom, power, and goodness; but the Deist has 
no revelation to fall back upon. The perplexing facts 
which demand to be explained are his only revelation of 
God. He may affirm that the Christian scheme affords 
-no light; and that is a contention which will have to 
be considered. Meanwhile, he has to justify these ways 
of God to those who protest: ‘Either your Creative 
Being could or could not have prevented evil in the 
world. If He could have made a better world but did 
not, He is not good; if He did the best He could, then 
He is not Almighty.’ 

What is a Deist to say to this dilemma? He dare 
not admit defect in God, and yet if, like Voltaire, he 


The Straits of Theism without Revelation. 111 


. insists that the Supreme Being must be perfect, but 
allows that the light of Nature is too dim to enable the 
| eyes of Reason to read His ways aright, his position 
is surrendered. By either admission all his boasted 


evidences of the existence and perfect benevolence of 


_ God are yielded to his opponents, and with them he Is 
bereft of all the weapons wherein he trusted to repel 
the assertion of Christ, ‘O righteous Father, the world 
hath not known Thee,’ and to silence the Atheist’s 
taunt, ‘ Where is now your God ?” 

It must be confessed that a believer in God is in 
severe straits when driven back into his own heart for 
a vindication of the Divine character against the mighty 
chorus of accusing voices which rise up from a groan- 
ing creation. If with nothing to sustain him but the 
passionate cry, ‘ He must be good,’ he can still hold fast 
faith in God, I would encourage him to do so by all 
means. I think that inner light is a true light, and one 
a man does well to walk by if he can find no other. I 
am persuaded that one who does so walk will be a better 
man than if he yielded up his faith to the contradictions 
of Nature and History. I have no wish to drive a Deist 
into Atheism if he will not become a Christian; but 
he must not affirm that Nature reveals a Perfect God 
simply because, when confronted with inexplicable facts, 
he still feels in his soul that God is good. 

The straits thus far pointed out are sufficiently severe, 
but they do not represent the whole difficulty of the 
Deistic position. Monotheism has a great history. 
The idea of an almighty, wise, and good God is very 
ancient, and has been handed down from sire to son 
from the days of ‘Father Abraham’ until now. Deism 


112 The Mystery of God. 


is the religion of the Patriarchs minus their faith in the 
personal providence and manifestation of God. But 
what an enormous deduction is thus made! They 
believed in God not merely as a First Cause of ideal 
perfectness, but as a personal Friend, a living Shield, 
and watchful Guide. Not by a cold intellectual 
theory, but by the energy of this high faith their lives 
were governed, and they attained to a dignity of 
character and to a sublimity of religious thought and 
language which have made them the most potent 
teachers of mankind. If Deism, therefore, be correct, 
we are confronted with this marvellous phenomenon. 
These men were right against the world in affirming 
the existence of One Almighty and good God, but 
were all either impostors or self-deluded when they 
said He had spoken to them by dream or oracle or 
sign! They were right in their conception of His 
Being, but wrong concerning the display of His good- 
ness in His ways with men. All that made God a joy 
to them and an object of personal trust and affection 
was illusory; all that has made their faith a power 
over human hearts was fictitious, and those promises 
in which they rejoiced concerning the future spread of 
their faith among all nations—promises which are being 
marvellously fulfilled in the religious history of mankind 
—were mere vain conceits! Surely when a theory 
brings us into such straits as these, we may be 
pardoned for adopting the words of Nicodemus: ‘ How 
can these things be ?’ 

But these unsolved problems are not the worst. 
Behind all that has been said there lies a grave moral 
difficulty which touches the character of God. Let it 


| 
5 


Le 


The Straits of Theism without Revelation. 113 


be imagined that some heroic theorist has dissipated 
to his own satisfaction all the difficulties thus far pre- 
sented: he must still be prepared to vindicate the cha- 
racter of the God in whom Abraham, Moses, and the 
Prophets trusted as their very present Helper, but who, 
according to Deism, really made no response to their 
appeals. An Almighty God must always have been 
able to put forth power, and to shed some light and 
joy upon His suppliants. But in what sense can this 
Almighty Being be good if He created men with such 
intense longings and such abject needs as the history 
of religion manifests, and yet withheld all rejoinder ? 
This point will come before us under a somewhat dif- 
ferent form hereafter; but the present chapter cannot 
close without insisting that the God of Deism is not 
good inthe same sense as that for which the God of 
Abraham has been worshipped for so many centuries. 
The God who hears and answers the prayers of men, 
and is their Refuge and Strength and very present Help 
in trouble, is not morally the same Being as one who 
sets them in a world like this, and then sits above the 
circle of the earth, and leaves them to themselves while 
ages multiply their sorrows and aggravate their diff- 
culties and cares. The Deist’s God is one who has 
rigorously forborne to stretch forth the hand which made 
and therefore could assist mankind, in spite of all the 
cries and tears and agonizing longings for His mercy 
which have filled the atmosphere of our globe from the 
beginning. Like those granite sphinxes which have 
looked down with changeless smile on the land of 
Egypt for forty centuries—while cities have been built 


and destroyed; while temples have risen and been 
8 


T14 The Mystery of God. 


filled with generations of troubled worshippers; while 
gepulchres have multiplied, and hot sands blown from 
the desert have covered ancient cornfields and broken 
monuments of perished glory—so the God of Deism, 
if that theory is true, has looked upon the earth while 
empires have arisen and decayed ; while false religions 
have grown and priesthoods have thriven, and while 
deluded peoples have despoiled themselves of wealth, 
and shed the blood of enemies, friends, and children 
on reeking altars which attest the passion of their 
hearts for God. Worst of all, this stony God looked 
on unmoved while Abraham lived a glorious life by the 
power of a faith that was false in allits most strengthen- 
ing and encouraging ideas ; while in supposed obedience 
to His will a holy temple rose in Jerusalem with a 
hidden mercy-seat, to which the purest human hearts 
were drawn as an emblem of His own hidden activities 
and responsiveness of grace ; while in the faith that He 
was helping and directing them, men like Elijah, Isaiah, 
and Jeremiah fought against the inroads of idolatry, — 
poured out their irony upon gods that had hands but 
handled not, and were powerless to save ; and while 
psalmists sounded notes of joyous praise to Himself as 
a just God and a Saviour, which are still ringing round 
the world in countless languages, making continents 
and islands glad. Surely the God who could gaze 
without response on men like these is not good in the 
same sense as that for which they worshipped Him, 
did exploits, and suffered martyrdom at the hands of 
an unworthy world! Such a God as this never was, and 
never can be, an object of confidence and love. If the 
existence of such a Being were once widely believed in, 


The Straits of Theism without Revelation. 115 


the prayers of the sons of men would be ended, praise 
would die away into silence, contrition and thanks- 
giving would lapse into indifference, and indifference 
would pass over into a sullen pessimism, which would 
overcloud the world with despondency and envelop in 
its gloom the very throne and character of God. 

In the face of man’s demand for a religion which 
shall meet the varied needs of his complex nature, 
Deism is found wanting. It cannot satisfy the intel- 
lect, or appease the conscience, or relieve the heart. 
Between the ‘no God’ of the Materialist and the God 
of the Bible, who is believed to actually exercise loving- 
kindness, righteousness, and mercy in the earth, there 
is no faith which can survive the fiery testing of the 
coming age. In the great battle between these two 
forces, all else is being swept from the field. The 
gods that have not made the heavens and the earth 
must, as an ancient prophet said, perish from beneath 
the heavens and from off the face of the earth. To- 
wards this event the conquests of science and the 
missions of the Christian Church are both contributing, 
and their failure is altogether inconceivable. No less 
surely may it be predicted that they will together pre- 
vail to dismiss from the thoughts and interest of man- 
kind a God who is supposed to dwell apart in lofty 
disregard of human needs. When God has been driven 
back behind the first emission of a creative germ, and 
is held from thenceforth to have practised an eternal 
policy of non-intervention in the business of His uni- 
verse, men will feel no contrition for neglecting Him 
who is unknown except as the Absentee Creator, the 
Great Neglecter of all His works. 3 

| 8—2 


CHAPLER Ye 
THE MYSTERY OF EVIL. 


Tue indictment of Nature, framed by J. S. Mill, pre- 
sents the argument against God’s goodness in a form 
to which Theism, apart from Revelation, is unable to 
make a satisfactory reply. We have now to see whether 
Christianity, if otherwise credible, is equal to the task. 
The issue raised may therefore be stated in the form of 
these two questions: 1. In what way does Christianity 
profess to harmonize the presence of pain and moral 
evil in the world with the Creator’s Goodness? 2. If 
Christianity be on other grounds credible as a revelation 
from God, does its solution of the mystery commend 
itself as worthy of acceptance? 

Throughout the following discussion, I shall pur- 
posely omit all reference to Satanic influence. Certain 
difficulties of a speculative kind are escaped by this 
means, but none which really belong to the present 
subject will be evaded. The alleged temptation of 
man by a member of another race may account for 
the introduction of evil into our world, but it in no way 
explains how evil could begin among the creatures of a 
Perfect Creator. It thus bears arelation to the Mystery 
of Evil similar to that which Sir W. Thomson’s ima- 


The Mystery of Evil. LUZ 


ginary meteoric stone bears to the Mystery of Life, 
Unable to account for the first transition from non- 
living to living matter on our globe, Sir W. Thomson 
suggested that possibly some living germs were brought 
here on the broken fragment of a perished world. The 
theory is ingenious, but it makes no contribution to- 
wards an understanding of how life began. It simply 
gives up the riddle as unanswerable from earthly data, 
and flings the inquirer into abysmal space and time to 
ask among imaginary worlds for information denied him 
where phenomena can be observed. If such an inci- 
dent were provable, it would possess unbounded inte- 
rest as a fact of history; but for the purposes of biology 
its value would be simply nothing. 

So with regard to the origin of Evil. Asa chapter 
of cosmical history the alleged introduction of evil into 
our world by a fallen angel is of unspeakable signifi- 
cance. It connects mankind with a vaster social order 
under the government of God, but it leaves us still to 
ask the same questions about the unknown race called 
‘angels’ as we now ask concerning men, and transfers 
our quest to realms which are unsearchable. Nor is 
this the only disadvantage. If non-human actors are 
included in the case for consideration, we are burdened 
with many doubtful disputations which in no way 
affect the issue. It then becomes necessary to inquire 
whether the account in Genesis is to be read literally, 
or whether the serpent and the trees of testing are 
symbolic. If the serpent be identified with a personal 
devil, curiosity is aroused about his mode of being, his 
method of access to man’s mind, the possibility of 
his redemption, and the historic circumstances which 


118 The Mystery of God. 


brought him into social relations with man and 
prompted him to compass the temptation. 

With regard to most of these questions, we have 
absolutely nothing but imagination for our guidance. 
The Jews believed that Satan was a good angel, the 
‘brightest and best of the sons of the morning,’ 
and that as such he was sent to this world as the 
ordained prince and minister of mankind. But they 
say his jealousy was moved by the sight of Adam, and 
his pride aggrieved by the command to serve this new 
favourite of heaven. Hence the desire to ruin man was 
his first insurrectionary thought against God. 

Milton’s version of how Satan came to earth is very 
different, and morally, is far more perplexing. He 
places the angelic fall in an age far anterior to man’s, 
and locates the event in heaven. According to his 
poem, Satan was— 

‘ Hurl’d headlong flaming from the ethereal sky, 

With hideous ruin and combustion, down 

To bottomless perdition. ... -’ 
From hell the defeated rebel escaped, and, Sapte by 
Chaos, traversed the gulf of Space, and landed as a 
malignant invader on this globe, to revenge his expul- 
sion from bliss by marring God’s new creation. 

The moral features of these two speculations are ex- 
ceedingly different. But who can decide which version 
is the truer, or whether either bears any near resem- 
blance to the facts? For the purposes of this chapter, 
however, we can afford to leave these dark themes 
alone. Those who rely on the statement that man was 
tempted by an alien foe, as a partial explanation of the 
earthly mystery of iniquity, are bound to answer, if 


The Mystery of Evil. 119 


pressed, the deeper question, how the foreign tempter 
became evil. If, however, we accept the task of show- 
ing how evil might come into existence under the reign 
of a good Creator, and could be allowed to propagate 
itself from life to life, without reflecting blame on Him, 
we shall have gone to the heart of the mystery, and the 
interpretation of Genesis may without prejudice be left 
an open question, as it was left in a previous chapter. 
The principles relied upon in the argument which fol- 
lows are such that, with a mere change of historic form, 
they could be applied to any race of moral beings, and 
are equally valid whether man was first tempted by an 
adversary or, without such instigation, was led away by 
his own desire and enticed. 

At the outset of the discussion it will greatly assist 
the reader to carefully observe and retain in mind a 
much-neglected distinction between moral causes and 
physical or mechanical causes.* Moral causes are the 
reasons why things are done or made; physical causes 
are the forces or means by which they are made or 
brought about. For the physical cause of an effect, we 
have always to search the past. Such a cause must 
always be antecedent to its effect in time. But moral 
causes are to be sought in the ‘afterwards.’ They con- 
stitute the end or object for which a thing is done, irre- 
spective of the meansemployed. Any intelligent being 
using physical means to bring abouta certain result, must 
have in his mind some end which he proposes to gain. 
He may or maynot communicate his intention to others: 

% T use the term ‘moral’ rather than ‘final’ because it is, for the 


present discussion, more precisely antithetic to ‘physical,’ and also 
because the word ‘final’ introduces some disputable ideas. 


120 The Mystery of God. 


_ but apart from such a revelation no one else can know 
what is in his mind. If his purposes are left for others 
to discover, they may form shrewd guesses while watch- 
ing the progress of his work, but are very likely to be 
wrong in their surmises, and certainly will be wrong if 
he, being much wiser than they, is aiming at something 
outside their range of thought. It stands to reason, 
therefore, that being thus in ignorance of the worker’s 
true purposes, these observers are not competent to 
judge of his methods, and will be unable to consciously 
assist in promoting his designs. This principle is so 
important, and has so many applications, that an illus- 
tration or two may not be superfluous. The late Mr. 
Babbage showed that a counting-machine could be 
constructed which would go on uniformly for an 
immense time, then vary, or go wrong, as we should 
say, once, twice, or any number of times, at given 
intervals, and then go on correctly as long as the 
materials held together. Let it now be supposed that 
a machine of this kind, made some years ago, has 
been discovered in an old-curiosity shop, by a 
mechanician who knows nothing of its maker’s inten- 
tions. By him its general purpose as a counting-machine 
would soon be ascertained, and we can imagine how 
he would call his friends together and say to them, 
This machine is a perfect counter. You will perceive 
by the register that it has been counting without pause 
for many years; I have watched it myself for a long 
time, and it never errs.’ But suppose, that while these 
words were falling from the exhibitor’s lips a false 
number should be indicated. What a break-down it 
would seem! What a defect, the company would agree, 


The Mystery of Evil. [21 


- was thus betrayed! But how instantly would this con- 
clusion be falsified if one of the company were to rise 
up and declare, ‘I have long been in search of that 
machine. I have brought from my library a book 
written by its maker, in which he states that it was 
constructed to vary when it reached a certain number. 
You may see for yourselves on this page that the num- 
ber specified agrees precisely with what has passed 
before our eyes.’ What a complete revulsion of feeling 
and reversal of judgment would be produced by this 
revelation of the maker’s purpose! When assured 
that the variation was foreseen and provided for, the 
apparent defect would be confessed a mark of wonder- 
ful precision, and the machine would be confessed a 
more marvellous instrument than any one had imagined 
before the arithmetical transgression occurred. 

This counting-machine has often been used to show 
that certain variations of natural order called ‘ miracles’ 
may be a part of that order if included in the Creator's 
original design, as the Christian scheme affirms. It 
might also be adduced to show the need for, and the 
value of, a revelation of God’s purposes, if men are to 
understand His works. But I only cite it now for a 
more limited purpose, viz., to show that an apparent 
defect may possibly be a mark of perfect adaptation 
to some special end, and whether that end or moral cause 
be discoverable or undiscoverable, revealed or unre- 
vealed, nothing is a defect in an instrument which fits 
it to fulfil its intended purpose. 

Another illustration may further show how this 
principle affects our present subject. In every text- 
book on Logic there are a number of fallacies as well as 


i232 The Mystery of God. 


many sound syllogisms. There is at least one specimen 
~ of every known form in which error can creep into our 
reasonings. But what would Mill have thought about. 
some juvenile critic who was verdant enough to point 
out these fallacies as proofs of their author’s mental 
incompetence! If he had patience to explain, he would 
say to his critic, ‘ My dear youth, I carefully made these 
fallacies to teach you and other novices in the art of 
thinking, what dangers await your minds directly you 
begin to reason, and to prepare you to detect and 
expose similar faults in writers who might otherwise 
carry you captive into error.’ 

The application of these illustrations to our subject 
must be obvious. A physical philosopher examining 
the world, and testing it by the standard of utility, for 
the purpose of providing comfort and pleasure, may 
well say it is a bad world. But Christianity teaches us 
to regard the physical world as a habitation adapted to 
promote man’s’ moral and intellectual discipline, rather 
than his mere comfort and pleasure. The doctrine 
of the Bible, from end to end, is that the creation was 
made subject to vanity in subordination to vast purposes 
of education and redemption. Unlike mere Deism, it 
does not deny or ignore any of the facts which Mill 
and others denounce, nor does it flinch from their dis- 
cussion. There is not a groan or a curse of modern 
pessimism which is not a renewal of ancient murmurs 
recorded in the Bible. The Bible is unique, however, 
in pointing to man’s discipline and God’s purpose of sal- 
vation as explanations of the pain with which the whole 
creation groans. Moral evil comes later in time than 
physical pain and death; yet it is assigned as the moral 


The Mystery of Evil. 123 


cause for their existence, just as death was the moral 
cause for which the Egyptian Pharoahs began to build 
their own monumental sepulchres, and even wrote the 
first portions of their epitaphs, while still alive to gloat 
over their vainglorious boasts. The explanation of 
vast ages of physical growth and decay on our planet 
can only be found in the preparation of the earth for 
man. Physical science teaches us that we eat our 
daily bread from materials stored up in the earth 
millenniums ago, and that without these no labour of 
herdsman or husbandman would be possible. Christi- 
anity preaches the higher, but harmonious doctrine, 
that these ages were all preparatory to the training 
of a mighty family in the love of goodness as better 
than comfort, or pleasure, or life. 

The general indication of this theory brings us at 
once face to face with the question: Is the existence 

of moral evil, under any circumstances and with any 
_ purpose in view, compatible with the Divine goodness ¢ 
~ Can man be evil, and man’s Maker good ? 

We may get some light at this stage by observing that 
any reply which would cast reproach on God as our 
Creator would, if valid, apply in a proportionate degree 
to our human parents, and to ourselves, if we are parents 
now, or ever venture to become such hereafter. I use this 
not as a mere tw quoque argument which proves nothing, 
but as a fair illustration or argument from analogy, 
and also as atest of what our estimate of life under 
present conditions actually is. Pessimists, as we have 
seen, whether Asiatic or European, are consistent in 
denouncing birth as the worst of evils, and parentage, 
rather than murder or suicide, as the chiefest crime. 


124 The Mystery of God. 


But the common conscience of mankind does not 
endorse this verdict. Job cursed the day on which he 
was born, but this was in a moment of weakness. It 
was, moreover, partly due to the fact that his own 
children were dead; and in all countries, and ages, 
where that old-world poem has been read, men have 
seen the dramatic propriety of associating Job’s re- 
covery of health and faith with the birth of a second 
family of sons and daughters, all of whom would have 
to undergo trial in their turn. We do not put on 
mourning when infants are born. We do not call our 
neighbours to come and fast and weep with us on our 
birthdays. These are usually glad festivals of mirth 
and congratulation, until old age makes them sad, as 
the last mile-stones on a journey towards the grave. 
As a matter of fact we do not regard our parents as 
enemies, nor should we deem it natural for our children 
so to regard us. Yet our parents knew we should 
suffer. They knew we should sin. They knew our 
lives would be exposed to great perils and awful possi- 
bilities. Those of us who are parents foreknew the 
same about our children, yet we should regard it as 
shameful and unnatural if they failed to love us and 
believe in our love for them. 

It may be urged against this comparison, that human 
parents are not blameworthy for introducing children 
into the world, because they have no power to provide a 
better abode or to create children of another order. 
But to thisa Pessimist would fairly reply that, inasmuch 
as men are not obliged to have children, their respon- 
sibility remains, and that unless our present life be 
better than non-existence, human parentage must be 


The Mystery of Evil. 125 


blamable. The argument from analogy therefore does 
not answer a Pessimist ; but it shows that unless it can’ 
be established that the Creator might have given us the 
advantage of our present existence, without its now 
attendant hardships and dangers, we can only impugn 
His goodness by taking sides with those who condemn 
human fatherhood and motherhood, and so contradict 
the general instincts and judgments of mankind. The 
argument is not supposed to be final or conclusive. It 
opens out a question concerning God which does not 
touch the case of men. But it has a distinct value 
because it helps to define the issue to be decided ; and 
if we succeed in proving that the moral difficulties of 
our present state are those to which finite moral beings 
are necessarily liable, it will suffice to condemn any 
petulant outcry against the creation of man. 

We have now to consider the question, ‘Can we 
think of the Almighty as able to create moral beings 
who shall be incapable of sin?’ Mill thought the 
only apology for such a creation as we know lay in 
a denial of the Creator’s omnipotence; but there is no 
need to resort to that hypothesis. We do not deny 
God’s omnipotence, by saying that He cannot produce 
two contradictory and mutually exclusive things. Om- 
nipotence cannot create a world and yet leave it un- 
created. So Omnipotence cannot create a volitional 
being and yet create him incapable of volitions. But 
directly a volitional being comes into existence, that 
renders every kind of conduct possible. If God dwelt 
alone in the universe, there would be no possibility of 
disobedience, or discord, or opposition. While only 
plants and lower animals existed on this earth His will 


126 | The Mystery of God. 


was not resisted. But directly a being stood on the 
ground, with power to choose between alternative lines 
of conduct, discord was possible. If man had been made 
incapable of departing from God’s will he would not have 
been a moral creature any more than a star, or a tree, 
or a steam-engine. A creature that can only act in one 
way, and that the way assigned and enforced by his 

_maker’s will, may be made.to go through a beautiful 
series of concerted movements, but then he is no more 
worthy of blame or praise than the ivory pieces on a 
chess-board when a game is lost or won. Such a being 
could not even see the difference between good and evil, 
and would remain as ignorant of the moral attributes 
of God as are the beasts of the field. The very word 
“*moral’ connotes, not indeed the necessity or even the 
certainty, but the possibility of what is called ‘im- 
morality.” To attribute a lack of goodness to God, 
therefore, for creating a race liable to sin, we must be 
prepared to maintain that it is immoral to create a 
moral being. 

It would carry us too far aside to fully consider an 
objection which may here arise in some minds, viz., 
that if only a free being is capable of goodness, then 
either God cannot be free, or, as free, must be capable 
of evil, This demur, like so many others, is a thing of 
terms. If it be answered by the admission that God 
is capable of evil, the words in their popular meaning 
would be almost blasphemous: yet in a more rigorous 
sense they would approach what most worshippers of 
God would joyfully acknowledge to be a truth. God’s 
goodness cannot be thought of as protected by the 
compulsion of any higher power than His own will, or 


age 


Lhe Mystery of Evil. 127 


by any force external to His own nature ; yet it may 
still be conceived of as due to His own unchangeable 
but nevertheless free choice. If that choice be an 
unchangeable fixture of His will, the fixity is not a 
mechanical immobility, but may be trusted in as eternal, 
if on no other ground, yet certainly on this, that good- 
ness, though not identical with wisdom, is so inseparably 
conjoined with it that evil.implies folly. Evil, as we 
see it among men, is more than foolishness; but it is 
always foolish, and is associated either immediately or 
remotely with some false idea of what will prove to be 
for man’s welfare. Unless, therefore, we can think of 
God as being deceived, we cannot conceive of Him as 
changeable in His choice. His infinite wisdom and 
knowledge must be impaired before He will alter a 
moral judgment. If, as Christians believe, there are 
already in another state of being ‘saints made perfect,’ 
they must still be as free in heaven as they were on 
earth. They are guaranteed against a renewed fall, 
however, by the experience through which they have 
been divinely led, and by the clear light for which that 
experience prepared them; a light into which, from its 
purity, nothing ‘ which maketh a lie’ can enter. Their 
knowledge and wisdom are still finite, and so error 
might conceivably creep in, if not excluded by their 
faith in the wisdom and love of God. This faith, which 
has, in Scripture language, been ‘tried with fire,’ 
secures their glad adhesion to the Divine will through- 
out the new experiences which await them in their 
future service; and so it carries within itself a pledge 
that ‘they will be as changeless as their Lord. This 
reference to the heavenly state is only introduced here 


128 The Mystery of God. 


as a hypothetic illustration of one manner in which 
moral freedom is compatible with perseverance in a 
choice which only a deceived mind can imaginably wish 
to alter. It assists us, therefore, to see how the un- 
changeableness of God’s character may be consistent 
with His moral freedom. By anticipation also it will 
be found to strengthen the statements advanced further 
on respecting the value of man’s present moral disci- 
pline. 

Returning from the digression into which we were led 
by the objection just discussed, it is submitted that the 
considerations previously advanced relieve the Creator’s 
name from many rash and baseless imputations; but the 
difficulty still remains—that He foreknew that man’s 
creation would issue in the doing of evil. Some writers 
have attempted to vindicate the goodness of God by 
denying His perfect foreknowledge. Theyseem to think 
that He would be less responsible for all that has 
transpired on earth, if He had not been sure that the 
experiment would take its present painful course. Such 
a theory, however, only aggravates the difficulty. It 
represents God as indulging in a tremendous experi- 
ment of which He could not foresee the issue: and 
which, therefore, might have filled the universe with 
hopeless anarchy and woe. If he could not foresee 
the first sin as a fact, much less could he foresee a 
satisfactory method of treating it, or a termination to 
human misery which would redound to His own glory. 
Such haphazard work would be in the highest degree 
culpable, and would be as incompatible with wisdom 
and righteousness as with perfect knowledge. 

Instead of inventing a cover for our perplexity by 


Lhe Mystery of Evtt. 129 


saying that God created in the dark, we must admit 
that, according to the teachings of Scripture, God 
created in the light—foreseeing all the effects of His 
work, and beholding the close of man’s history as 
plainly as the beginning. Christianity represents God 
as having considered it good for man to be, good 
for him to pass through all we now look back upon, 
all we now experience, and all that still remains to 
be done and suffered ; but it claims to set before us a 
sequel to the history which was present to God’s mind 
before the world was framed—a sequel which will 
amply recompense our race for all its struggles, and 
_ turn the groaning of creation into an exultant halle- 
lujah to the Lord God who hath done all things well. 


We have now to inquire into the nature of that 
sequel to man’s history, which is set before us in the 
Scriptures as the moral cause of our creation and sub- 
jection to vanity and trial. 

In one broad sentence, we may say that Righteous- 
ness is displayed as the ultimate aim of God in creating 
man; and this righteousness, though infinitely higher 
than joy, is to have joy for its fruitage in heaven, 
although its roots are nourished by the salts of earthly 
pain and sorrow. 

To appreciate this pure purpose which underlies all 
the most gorgeous imagery of the Apocalypse, as well 
as the didactic utterances of the prophets and apostles, 
and of Christ, we need to observe the distinction be- 
tween innocenceand righteousness. Innocence means 
simply freedom from the positive guilt of doing evil. 
It is a state consistent with ignorance, feebleness, and 


9 


130 The Mystery of God. 


moral inactivity. Righteousness imports the actual 
choice and practice of what is good. Innocence may 
be a standing still, or a lying down, in infantile sub- 
missiveness. Righteousness must be active, progressive 
and assertive of fixed determinations of the will. It is 
the actual going forward of a free moral agent along a 
true straight line, swerving neither to the right hand 
nor the left. A new-born babe or a newly created man 
may therefore be innocent, but cannot conceivably be 
righteous. | 

The Scriptures never represent man as having fallen 
from a state of righteousness but only from a state of 
innocence. They represent the first pair as without 
any perception of Good or Evil until a positive obliga- 
tion not to do some particular thing was impressed 
upon their minds; and so desire and curiosity were 
excited, debate arose, and the difference between good 
and evil was found by the miserable experience of 
knowing they had done what they felt ought to have 
been left undone. It would be difficult to imagine any- 
thing more childish and primitive than the conduct 
narrated in Genesis, however the garniture of the tale 
be interpreted. That story (as shown in a previous 
chapter, p. 107) is as consistent with the evolution of 
man’s physical nature from lower animals as with an 
entirely new creation from dust. The difficulties of 
man’s physical evolution are physical not moral; they 
are difficulties of science and its teachers, not of the 
Bible and its expounders. The Bible version is not, 
as many absurdly assume, that the whole earth was a 
garden of Eden, or that man was created in Paradise. 
The general state of the earth is depicted as one of 


Lhe Mystery of Evit. 131 


o 


natural untilled wildness, and from that outer wild, man 
was taken and placed in a prepared garden to com- 
mence his experience as a moral being. Thence again, 
after transgression, he was sent back to the unre- 
claimed land to work out his history, burdened with the 
mournful memory of folly, but cheered with a hope of 
Divine aid and ultimate victory. 

Passing over the intervening history, we must now 
look on to the culminating visions of the Christian 
scheme, that the two states may be compared. In 
these visions we see man in a very different condition. 
Even in allegory he is not represented as regaining 
paradise, as if the starting post were also the goal of all 
his course. Heaven is not depicted as a primitive 
garden where naked creatures walk unconscious of 
nakedness and in infantile innocence. It is a city 
or social order, where the inhabitants are clothed, but 
in garments which are white as snow, and pure as 
joy, and which conceal no secret thoughts of shame. 
In Eden there was no crown on Adam’s brow, but 
there are crowns of pure gold, 7.c., of unalloyed honour, 
in heaven. There may have been palm-trees in para- 
dise, but no branch waved in Adam’s hand, for he had 
won no victory; but every inhabitant of heaven carries 
this Oriental emblem of triumph. There was music 
in Eden—the music of singing birds and laughing 
waters, and the rustling of leaves; man’s voice also 
was no doubt passing sweet; but there were no songs 
of praise, no intelligent adorations of Divine glory 
flung out into the air, no swelling harmonies of thanks- 
giving for goodness, no laudation of power and wisdom 
and holiness made manifest by Divine action to the 


Cane 


132 The Mystery of God. 


‘created mind. But heaven is described as full of over- 
flowing worship, and resounding with spontaneous 
praise. In Eden we see man wandering in ignorant 
wonder and laying the first childlike foundations of 
intellectual work in the production of a spoken language 
by giving names to the things he saw. God communes 
with him in some simple way; but in all this he is 
represented as coming down—coming down to man’s 
simplicity and inexperience; and of His name or 
nature Adam has but the vague idea of a Power higher 
than himself—a Power he ought to obey, and yet may 
possibly rival if he be bold. Of God’s character, as 
that is portrayed in the Name given to Moses, ‘The 
Lord, a God full of compassion and gracious, slow 
to anger, and plenteous in mercy and truth ’—and 
as declared by Jesus, the ‘ Righteous Father’—Adam, 
while ignorant of good and evil, could have no more 
notion than a man born blind has of colour. To sucha 
novice the ideas we see growing in the Old Testament, 
and matured in the New, were as incommunicable as the 
doctrine of decimals or the law of gravitation to a new- 
born child. The moral reflections which Milton puts 
into the lips of Adam and Eve before their fall may be 
excused on the score of poetic license, but they consti- 
tute an absurd anachronism. They are as contrary to 
Scripture and common sense as if he had made them 
to discourse under their leafy canopy on the laws of epic 
poetry, the advantages of republican institutions, the 
liberty of the press, or the right of divorce. But in the 
vision of heaven the people are all illuminated with 
exalted views of the Divine nature. They know a 
name of the Most High still unpronounceable in any 


Lhe Mystery of Evil. 133 


human language. It is no more God coming down to 
man, but man lifted up to God. Those worshippers — 
have become acquainted with Him in days of sorrow 
and sin, and have learned by a thousand experiences 
to confide in His wisdom, power, and love. They have 
felt the misery of doubt and disobedience, and delibe- 
rately renounced the thought of doing better for them- 
selves than God is able or willing to do for them. 
Their wills have not been extinguished or superseded, 
but have been brought by an ample experience into an 
eager and delightful agreement with the will of God. 
Hence the vision is one of perfect order, and the reign 
of that law of love which is the law of laws, the bond 
of unity, and the pledge of continuity throughout the 
universe for ever. It is a vision of triumph, in which 
Creator and creation, Master and servants, Father and 
children, Redeemer and redeemed, all joy and rejoice 
together; a vision of love purged from impurity by 
sacrifice, and of righteousness rendered incorruptible 
by the fires of a Refiner who has made a suffering 
world His crucible, that so the faith and love of the 
sons of men, more precious than fine gold, may redound 
at last unto his own praise and glory and honour. 

It will scarcely be disputed that such a state as is 
thus meagrely indicated, immeasurably transcends in 
moral worth a condition of untried innocence. To fill 
many mansions throughout space with such triumphant 
and exalted hosts of deathless sons, must be regarded 
as an object worthy of an omnipotent God. Men 
may say it is a dream, but at any rate it isa magnificent 
dream. It isa dream every well-wisher of his race must 
at least desire that man may realize. If it be rejected, 


-134 The Mystery of God. 


it must be rejected as too sublime, too sanguine, too 
rapturous for verity. But, at any rate, it is what Christi- 
anity affirms shall come to pass; and if it come to 
pass, Paul will be acknowledged to have taken a sober 
estimate of value when he reckoned that the sufferings 
of this present age are not worthy to be compared 
with the glory to be revealed. 

It must not be concealed or overlooked, however, that, 
in presenting this as the moral causeassigned by Christi- 
anity for man’s creation, it needs to be supported against 
some particular objections. It will be urged by some that 
they would willingly regard such a consummation asan 
adequate solution of the mystery of moral evil, if there 
were no dark background of future torment—if it could 
be shown that this bright future represents the future 
condition of the race, and not merely of a small section 
of it, and if further it were made plain that no easier 
or directer road. might have been laid down for its 
attainment. With respect to the mystery of pain, it 
may also be objected, that, although man’s eventual 
triumph would be an adequate solution in so far as he 
bears pain for his own good; yet the sufferings of the 
lower animals are not so obviously accounted for by 
this sequel to human history. 

It is impossible to treat these vast themes adequately 
in this connection. Interpreters of Scripture differ in 
the conclusions they draw from its statements on these 
matters, but there are a few broad principles which 
are beyond fair dispute. 

It will be convenient to deal first with the case of 
animal pain. It has already been conceded to Theists 
who reject Christianity that animals suffer far less than 


Lhe Mystery of Evtt. ies 


we are apt to imagine. They are unable to discuss 
whether their life is worth living, and it is difficult. for 
us to understand their position. Probably, however, 
their pleasures predominate over pain, and if they lack 
our human joys they are also free from our human 
sorrows, and from the agonies of moral warfare. But 
granting all this, the question still remains, Why the 
remainder of pain? Are there, according to Christian 
teachings, any purposes subserved by it of sufficient im- 
portance to justify its permission by a good Creator ? 

A volume might be written on the relation of the 
animals to man, and it would be easy to show that we 
at any rate profit greatly by their sufferings. Science 
has discovered that those innumerable creatures which 
tenanted the earth before man have bequeathed incal- 
culable legacies to our race. It teaches that both by 
their living activitiesand their decayin death they helped 
to render this cooling fire-ball fit for human habitation, 
adorning it with beauty and storing it with inexhausti- 
ble provisions for our use. It tells us that nothing now 
exists in vain, but that every living thing in earth and 
water plays some beneficial part in the commonwealth 
of Nature. 

The Scriptures throughout coincide with these teach- 
ings as to the subordination of animals to man’s wel- 
fare; but, taking a broader and profounder view of human 
wellbeing, they connect these lower creatures with our 
‘moral discipline and religious education. According to 
the Bible the whole system of nature, animate and in- 
animate, is held together in one mysterious but insepa- 
rable bond of unity. The most vivid exhibition of this 
principle is to be found in the magnificent imagery of 


136 The Mystery of God. 


Ezekiel i. There we see inanimate nature moving in 
“mystic harmony with the animate creation headed by 
man. Bothalike are surrounded with storm-clouds and 
fire, symbolic of the mystery of evil; while in the vault 
above there is a vision of the King Eternal. His presence 
seems most terrible, but His throne is surrounded by a 
rainbow, suggestive of the truth that His tender mercies 
are over all His works, and that when the storms of judg- 
ment and the fires of discipline have done their work, the 
whole realm of Nature will rejoice before Him in right- 
eousness and peace. The whole teaching of the Bible is 
consistent with this vision. Nothing suffers or rejoices 
alone, or is permitted to have an isolated history. All 
things are declared to be for our sakes, and to be work- 
ing together for the good of those who are being re- 
deemed. Even the ground was cursed for man’s sake 
—not in a fit of foolish and misdirected anger, as undis- 
cerning captiousness would read the statement in 
Genesis, but because man needed the discipline of 
labour; and, as Buckle, unconsciously becoming a 
Christian apologist, has proved, would best have his 
faults corrected, and his noblest powers called into 
activity, by the stress of an arduous struggle to exist. 
In the same manner animals are represented as existing 
not merely or chiefly for themselves, but for man. 
They are given to him for food and as helpers of 
his toil. He is their lord, but has to contend 
for dominion over them, and can only prevail by 
courage and rectitude. They are frequently allowed 
to scourge his vices, and yet often share his chastise- 
ment, as in famine, pestilence, and war. Their par- 
ticipation in man’s fortunes was pathetically illustrated 


The Mystery of Evil. 137 


by their appointment as victims for the sacrificial 
altar. Their subjection with man to the Divine will 
and their unconscious hope in the Divine mercy were 
represented in the Cherubim which overshadowed the 
ark, as though peering into the mystery still hidden from 
all created beings in heaven and on earth. Further- 
more, Philo did not exaggerate the functions of the 
Jewish High Priest, but simply called attention to a 
seldom-noticed truth when he observed that ‘he offers 
the prayers and thanksgivings, not only for very race 
of men, but also on behalf of Nature in all her parts,— 
earth, water, and fire; for he regards the world as his 
fatherland (as indeed it truly is), and is wont to in- 
tercede for it with its Ruler, imploring Him to impart 
His own mild and merciful nature to His creation.”* 

Passing over much that is profoundly interesting and 
suggestive in the prophets, we find all these ancient 
ideas and symbols supplemented in the teachings of 
the New Testament concerning the person and purposes 
of Christ. The doctrine of the incarnation affirms that 
if God subjects His creatures to a mysterious fellow- 
ship of suffering, He does not stand aloof Himself. If 
the Logos became flesh, as the Scriptures declare, He 
thereby took upon Himself our nature in its affinity to 
the lower animals. In His human sufferings, He became 
a partaker of animal pain in its broadest sense, and on 
the cross He tasted the bitterness of animal death as 
truly as the countless beasts which had previously been 
slain on Jewish altars. The darkness which surrounded 
the cross included the twofold mystery of pain and moral 

® €De Monarchia,’ ii. 6, ii. p. 227. Quoted in the original by 
Canon Wescott on 1 John ii. 2. 


138 The Mystery of God. 


_ evil, and whatever light of love and mercy streams out 
from thencemust needs have power to irradiate the lower 
plains as well as the highest peaks of life. The cross 
is a revelation of God’s infinite sympathy with His 
creatures, and it is impossible to draw a line which 
shall cut off its significance from any sentient portion 
of the world. Paul discerned and clearly expressed 
this principle. He saw in the cross not only a revela- 
tion of Divine sympathy, but a sign and pledge of the 
Divine power to deliver the whole creation from bond- 
age to vanity. According to him nature’s pain, which 
God in Christ descended to partake, is a prolonged 
travail to bring forth the new creation. It is not an 
expiring groan, not a long death-throe, but a coming to 
birth, whereby the entire creation having suffered 
together shall at last also rejoice together with the 
Lord its maker, because ‘the whole creation which 
geroaneth together until now’ shall also ‘be delivered 
from the bondage of corruption into the liberty of the 
glory of the children of God’ (Rom. vill. 21). Nor 
was Paul alone in these anticipations. They are not 
obscurely implied by another apostle-when he speaks 
of Christ as an abiding propitiation, not only for the sins 
of men, but also for ‘the whole cosmos.’ They are also 
clearly embodied in the symbolic vision of heaven in the 
Apocalypse (Rev. iv.). In this scene the throne of 
God, which Ezekiel saw above the clouds and storms of 
tribulation, appears in perfect brightness, and sur- 
‘rounded ‘with the forms of rejoicing worshippers to 
whom the mystery of evil has become an open secret. 
But these worshippers are not only human as repre- 
sented in the elders, for with them are figures which 


Lhe Mystery of Evil. 139 


represent the ideal unity of animated life, and these 
join in giving glory to God and to the Lamb, who has 
unsealed the books of God’s strange ways, and unfolded 
the uses of pain, and strife, and death, in bringing many 
sons to glory. Furthermore, when these living creatures 
offer praise, the elders are said to fall down and worship 
Him that sitteth on the Throne, saying, ‘ Worthy art 
Thou, our Lord and our God, to receive the glory and the 
honour and the power: for Thou didst create all things, 
and because of Thy will they wete, and were created.’ 
I am well aware that these thoughts are likely to 
start some dark and difficult questions. They suggest, 
but do not necessarily involve, the idea of a future life 
for the lower animals. Butler long ago admitted that 
several arguments which favour man’s continued exist- 
ence after death tell quite as strongly in favour of 
the inferior creatures, and many Christian thinkers 
have gone beyond that admission. My present argu- 
ment, however, does not require a discussion of the 
exegetical or philosophical problems involved in such 
aview. This chapter is not concerned to prove the 
credibility of Scripture doctrines in themselves, but 
only to ask whether, if otherwise credible, they warrant 
our faith in God’s goodness? I submit, therefore, that 
the statements advanced show that the mystery of 
animal suffering is not overlooked in the Bible: that 
God is distinctly declared to have subjected these 
creatures to whatever appears strange and hard in 
their lot, for wise and benignant ends; and that in 
fellowship with redeemed humanity, ‘all things that 
have breath will yet’ praise the Lord. It is the dis- 
tinct teaching of Christianity that when man, crowned 


140 The Mystery of God. 


and glorified, magnifies Him who has translated him 
out of darkness into light, he will offer no selfish 
adoration, nor will he be forgetful of those humbler 
races which shared his travail, but will find in a per- 
fected creation a perpetual incitement to proclaim the 
goodness of Him by whom all things were made. 
Turning now to the objections which relate to 
man’s future condition, it must be observed in 
the first place that those notions of physical torture 
which used to pass current as Scriptural are gross 
perversions of Biblical metaphors. The combination 
of such incompatible things as darkness, fire, and worms 
proves this. Darkness cannot exist where flame is, and 
where flame is worms are not. That there will be tri- 
bulation and agonizing remorse hereafter for those who 
sin against light, is taught in Scripture: and if it were 
not, man’s conscience would say that it ought to be. 
Multitudes go out of the world in such a moral condition 
that God could not prevent them from suffering remorse 
and shame, unless He obliterated memory and virtually 
annihilated their souls. If Christianity had taught that 
there is no judgment, and that the wicked and the 
righteous will be immediately and equally happy after 
death, it would have been inferior morally to some 
heathen conceptions. Men would have scouted as 
false and corrupting the idea that Nero, Caligula, 
Philip of Spain, and cruel wretches who make a sport of 
murder, should straightway be beatified together with 
holy women and innocent children and with valiant 
martyrs for righteousness’ sake. The Roman Catholic 
torture-pit is an invention of priests, who themselves used 
the stake and the axe without remorse. But the Bible 


The Mystery of Evil. 141 


view of God is that although He has no pleasure in the 
death of the wicked, and judgment is His ‘strange 
work,’ yet that, as a righteous moral Governor, He will 
presently divide the evil from the good, because their | 
commingling after death would mean a renewal of 
nearly. all that makes earthly society a peril and a 
grief to well-meaning men. Strong terms are merci- 
fully used by Christ to declare the woful consequence 
of resisting kindness, mercy, and moral help; but 
those terms are all of a highly figurative character, and 
they describe not created torments, but the mental suf- 
ferings of those who bemoan their misused powers, lost 
opportunities, and rejected overtures of love. 

With regard to the numbers of those who attain to 
glory, Christ was very reticent. When asked about it 
He simply urged His questioners to strive to enter the 
narrow door, lest they should be shut out of His king- 
dom as one generation of their fathers had been shut 
out from the Promised Land, because too cowardly and 
unbelieving to encounter their opponents. He reminded 
them under many figures that salvation means victory, 
and that victory means difficulty, but that ruin means 
only self-surrender to defeat. Salvation means an entry 
into life by a door through which men can only pass 
one by one, because each man apart is accountable to 
God for his life. But ruin means a careless yielding to 
the surge of a pleasure-loving crowd. 

This reticence of Christ’s may well be accepted asan 
example by His servants, and is one which the apostles 
evidently followed. Language which seems to promise 
4 more convenient opportunity for repentance in the 
next world to those who shirk its troubles now, must be 


142 1 he Mystery of God. 


adverse to the best interests of men, and is contrary to 
the evident aim and spirit of the Scriptures. But the 
Bible does not teach as a dogma that the truth and 
love which were in Jesus Christ can never reach the 
spirits which are imprisoned in the dungeons of their 
sin. It was once asked of a learned theologian, who 
taught that man’s doom is fixed irrevocably at death: 
‘Supposing in some far age, when you have long en- 
joyed the Father’s house, Christ were to bring in a 
company of men from the outer darkness, could you look 
up to Him and say, ‘‘ Lord, this is contrary to the 
words of the Bible we believed on earth”? Could you 
say, ‘‘ That book deceived me” ?’ And he answered 
after a pause, ‘No, I could not truly say that.’ It 
was asked again, ‘Do you think that any man who 
had been himself redeemed from evil by undeserved 
goodness would ever play the part of the elder son in 
the golden parable, if such prodigals were brought in 
hereafter ?? Again he answered, ‘No.’ Still again 
it was asked, ‘ Supposing, in some manner not revealed 
because no part of any needed revelation upon earth, 
God were to overcome His last rebellious creature, and 
so were to fulfil the word of Paul and ‘‘reconcile all 
things unto Himself,” whether on earth or elsewhere, 
should we not feel that this was a crowning glory and 
delight, and a fulfilment of many starry hints studded 
over Scripture?’ Once more he replied, ‘ It would.’ 

If there are any students of the Scriptures in their 
original tongues, who would refuse to make the same 
admissions, they must be very few. It cannot be 
denied that readers of the English version, whether 
authorised or revised, may well think the language of 


The Mystery of Evil. 143 


Scripture stronger than it really is.* It is also evident 
that Christ meant men to feel that by their treatment 
of Himself and of His words they were for all practical 
purposes of finite calculation making a permanent 
decision. The stubbornness of the human will, more- 
over, and God’s clear resolve not to abrogate its liberty, 
and so destroy man’s moral nature, render it supremely 
presumptuous to say dogmatically that no soul of man 
will fail of heaven at last. But, making all these allow- 
ances, it may safely be affirmed that the following 
propositions, given substantially in Scriptural language, 
represent the clear teachings of Christianity. 

The love of God is for the world as a whole, and 
includes His adversaries, just as He teaches us to love 
our enemies and to do them good. The mediation of 
Christ is for mankind as one, although its benefits are 
appropriated individually. Its object is to unite all 
severed peoples into one, and in one body to reconcile 
them unto God. The desire of God is that all men 
should be saved, and come to the knowledge of the 
truth. The most inclusive and far-reaching words of 
prophecy:are those which say that God’s purpose is to 
gather together all things into one in Christ, and that 
Christ is to reign as King until He has subdued all things 
to Himself, and that then the kingdom shall be de- 


* For an impartial discussion of the word ‘Eternal,’ see The 
Spirits in Prison,’ by Dean Plumptre, p. 356. That the strongest 
terms used in Scripture do not necessarily denote absolutely endless 
duration may, however, be seen immediately by looking at the 
revised translation of 2 Tim. i. 9, and Jude vi. The former passage 
speaks of something which happened before times ‘ Eternal’ began ; 
the latter assigns the day of judgment as the terminus of an ‘ ever- 
lasting ’ imprisonment. 


144 The Mystery of God. 


livered up unto the Father, that God may be all 
in all.* 

If this statement of Scripture teaching be accepted 
as fair, and the vision it unfolds be deemed a worthy 
moral cause of man’s creation, it may still be objected: 
Granting the magnificence and moral worth of the end 
to be gained, could not man have been caused to reach 
it by an easier and directer road? 

The answer to this question is emphatically ‘ No!’ 
Such a goal could not conceivably be reached by any 
shorter path. Omnipotence could not create men with 
the ripe results of moral conflict in their hearts and 
minds prior to any actual experience. There are some 
people who believe that the countless millions of fossils 
which lie embedded in the earth’s crust never were 
living animals, but were created to simulate dead 
species, just as they now appear. Such a monstrous 
notion is plausible compared with the idea of creating 
moral beings as ready-made victors in a heavenly state 
of blessedness. God could create any number of golden 
crowns and leafy palms and robes of spotless white; but 
if these were worn by creatures who had never fought 
and conquered, never been tempted and delivered, the 
heavenly city would have no more moral grandeur than 
an exhibition of waxen kings and warriors. Nay, worse, 
it would be a created fraud, an everlasting lie. The joy 
and glory of theredeemed areconditioned by the fact that 
they have truly been in and have come out of tribulation. 

Again, not only is this process essential to the result, 


* For a justification of the above statements, see, amongst other 
passages, John ii. 16,17; Matt. v. 4348; 1 Tim. il. 1—6, iv. Io ; 
Titus i,7?1—14.;°Col..i) 19, 20 ;-Eph, 1. 705° Cor. xv. 28. 


The Mystery of Evit. 145 


but it isa process which must manifestly be very gra- 
dual and protracted. When once man had started on 
the experiment of living according to his own inclina- 
tions and desires, he was bound to exhaust every 
plausible scheme of utility and pleasantness, just as 
Christ indicates in the parable of the Prodigal Son. 
The father in that parable might have locked his son, 
as a prisoner, in his chamber, or have set his servants 
to watch against his departure for abroad, like the 
father of Gotama in the Buddhist myth. But what 
would have been the effect of thisrepression? Having 
once formed the wish to go, that son could never be a 
free and willing resident in his father’s house until he 
had tried the far country and been reduced to say of 
his own accord, ‘I will arise, and return.’ So with 
the human race. It would have destroyed the whole 
condition of man’s existence, and frustrated the final 
result, if God had averted catastrophes by preventing 
the complete outworking of any experiment, however 
wearisome and disastrous, before man confessed it a 
failure. But many of the schemes which have been 
devised have required ages and generations to work 
out. Dreams of social order and systems of thought 
are not ripened and found faulty in a day; and yet it 
is only as one after another is tried and found wanting 
that men are humbled to consider what professes to be 
the counsel and commandment of God. Hence the 
slow march of ages—wherein nations, religions, and 
philosophies rise and decline—becomes indispensable 
to the development of such a far-reaching purpose as 
Christianity ascribes to God. Human experience must 
needs include the mystery of lawlessness and suffering, 
+ 10 


146 The Mystery of God. 


until the race is brought to confess as one man, ‘I 
‘have sinned, and it profited me not.’ ‘Lo, I come to 
do thy will, O God! With the iron pen of my ex- 
perience, Thou hast written Thy law in my mind, and 
Thy loving-kindness has put it into my heart. From 
henceforth it shall be my delight.’ 

The argument now nears its close. It only needs for 
its completeness a final statement of what has been 
implied all through, viz., That such a scheme of moral 
glorification for man as Christianity unfolds necessitates 
some of those alleged defects in Nature which are so often 
arraigned as incompatible with the goodness of God. 

If men are to find out for themselves the difference 
between Good and Evil, it must be in a world which 
admits of various consequences being attached to 
different lines of conduct. The far country was a hard 
place to live in, but for the younger son it was the 
best possible place a father’s love could have devised; 
and the famine, if caused by the father, would have 
been as great a proof of inexorable kindness as the 
feast spread.and the music called for at the coming 
home; even the swine, by their repulsive grossness, 
assisted to drive the prodigal to arise from his 
animalism, and seek a more rational and _ spiritual 
life with his father. That parable contains in part 
Christ’s explanation of the mystery of pain and want 
in His Father’s world. .If men are to learn such 
lessons as Christianity says we need, there must be 
suffering, or the nature of wrong will be concealed. 
The innocent, also, must often suffer with the guilty, 
or one of the worst natural consequences of sin, which 
is to injure others, must be miraculously arrested, and 


eee ee 


The Mystery of Evil. 147 


so the exceeding bitterness of sin be hidden from man’s 
eyes. Virtue must have a preponderating advantage, 
and must have many encouragements, or the moral 
judgments of men will be obscured; but virtue must 
often miss any outward regard or acknowledgment, 
and must often endure injustice, in order that the 
integrity of men may be tried. Mitigations of penalty, 
pardons and restorations, must be accorded, or every 
idea of amendment will be shut out, and despair be- 
come an everlasting prison-house for the race. Yet 
some of the temporal results of sin must be allowed 
to accrue even after, and in spite of, repentance, or 
delay in forsaking sin will lose its penalty, and moral 
warnings become like nursery bogies which, as children 
soon find out, have no existence. If men are to be 
lifted up out of evil, motives which they can appreciate 
while still in a degraded state must be afforded; and 
yet, as they advance, other motives must come into 
play which supersede the first, and shine them away 
through the working of a noble shame: just as we 
see in many Christian men, that the mere self-interested 
desire to escape from punishment which stirs them at 
the first is transformed, little by little, into a sublime 
aspiration to share the service and sacrifice of Christ 
for the good of all. In any case, man needs to have 
the path of transgression made hard, and the path 
of righteousness made steep, but not impossible; and 
above all things he needs to have a hope set before him 
to call out all his noblest powers in pursuit of the final 
good which God is seeking to confer. The very pledge 
and potency of success in such a design must consist in 
the reconciliation of man to the sway and guidance of 
I0—2 


148 The Mystery of God. 


the Eternal Wisdom: and whatsoever God can do by 
the discipline of pain and sorrow to bring men to receive 
such mercies, such sympathies, and such succour as 
are the burthen of the Gospel, and to induce them to 
arise and seek the glory there held out to human hopes, 
must be regarded as an evidence of Divine goodness. 
The defects of the natural world, considered as an abode 
furnished for man’s temporal comfort and convenience, 
are its perfections as a place of moral discipline; and, 
unless falsehood be sublimer than truth, the cross of 
Christ, followed by his exaltation to the throne, declares 
not only the righteousness of God in forgiving wrong, 
but also in permitting pain. The mystery of evil must 
remain to those who disbelieve the Christian scheme. 
But that mystery assuredly is solved for all who verily 
believe that the men whose sufferings Christ partook 
shall one day share His risen joy, and reign with Him 
as kings of righteousness over the many cities of His 
Father’s realm. It is not pretended that any effort of 
thought, or any word of revelation, can at once lift our 
minds out of the obscurity which encompasses our 
path. Clouds and darkness are round about us, and 
the strongest faith cannot prematurely disperse the 
clouds, or render the darkness while it lingers as cheer- 
ful as the light to our hearts; but the doctrines of 
Christ are a light shining in the darkness, and they say 
to all who receive them that the Mystery of Evil is like 
the thick cloud into which Moses entered on Mount 
Sinai—a darkness where God is, and a darkness from 
which man will presently emerge with the lustre of a 
Divine glory on his face. 


CHAPEE Reva: 
THE MIRACLE OF REVELATION. 


REVELATION is not necessarily miraculous. The order 
of nature reveals something of the mind which origin- 
ated it. As Keble sings: 


‘ There is a book, who runs may-read, 
Which heavenly truth imparts, 


The works of God above, below, 
Within us and around, 

Are pages in that book, to show 
How God Himself is found.’ 


Science is a welcome pedagogue, teaching men to read 
that great book which existed before man invented 
writing, or had ‘eyes to see’ the wondrous. hiero- 
glyphics which abound in the heavens and on the earth. 
Materialism sees no revelation in nature, for she says 
that this great book has no author. Pantheism insists 
that the book and its author are the same; writer, 
writing, and readers all absolutely one. Deism affirms 
that God produced the book by creating a self- 
composing apparatus. According to this theory the 
Canon of Scripture was closed when creation was 
finished; and the Author never stoops to explain or 
supplement it, although man has blundered for so 


150 The Mystery of God. 


many centuries in his attempts to decipher the letters, 
and still finds that many pages are written in an 
unknown language. Christianity declares that, in 
addition to this book of nature, God has spoken unto 
men ‘by divers portions and in divers manners,’ and 
specially ‘in His Son,’ ‘through whom also He made 
the worlds’ (Heb. i. 1, 2). It is her belief that many 
of these spoken words are recorded in the Bible, and 
that in them we have light and truth on matters of 
supreme importance, concerning which Nature is silent, 
or her testimony too obscure for human hearts to 
understand. 

In previous chapters we have seen how impossible 
it is to read in nature a satisfying revelation of Divine 
goodness in the creation and government of this world. 
We have also seen that the Bible propounds a comple- 
mentary doctrine which, if credible on other grounds, 
must be confessed not merely acceptable but sublime. 
Our business now is to consider whether the doctrine 
can reasonably be received as a Divine Revelation. 
This discussion will extend itself over the remaining 
chapters of this volume. 

The scope of the present chapter corresponds to 
that of Mill’s Essay on Revelation: and although not 
solely a criticism of that essay, its subject cannot be 
better stated than by a quotation from his opening 
paragraph: ‘It would be beyond the purpose of this 
Essay, to take into consideration the positive evidences 
of the Christian, or any other belief, which claims to 
be a revelation from Heaven. But such general con- 
siderations as are applicable not to a particular system, 
but to Revelation generally, may properly find a place 


The Miracle of Revelation. 151 


here.’* It will be observed that the word ‘ Revelation ’ 
is here used in the special sense which involves a 
miracle, 7.¢., the direct action of the Divine Will inside 
the realm of law; and in this chapter it will be em- 
ployed in the same way. 

Starting ‘on the hypothesis of a God, who made 
the world, and in making it had regard . . . to the 
happiness of His sentient creatures,’ Mill allows the 
possibility of a miracle on the ground that He who 
was able to create the universe ‘ may well be thought to 
have the power to modify it’ (pp. 215 and 232). He also 
concedes over and above this abstract possibility that 
‘there is no antecedent improbability in the supposition 
that His concern for their good would continue, and 
that He might once or oftener give proof of it by com- 
municating to them some knowledge of Himself beyond 
what they were able to make out by their unassisted 
faculties, and some knowledge or precepts useful for 
guiding them through the difficulties of life.’ ‘The 
only question to be entertained, and which we cannot 
dispense ourselves from entertaining, is that of evidence. 
Can any evidence suffice to prove a Divine revelation ? 
And of what nature, and what amount, must that 
evidence be ?’ (p. 215). 

It is important at the outset to understand the 
precise bearing of these questions. They do not merely 
affect the credibility of certain groups of miracles 
recorded in the Bible, but the possibility of any real 
intercourse between man and God. Hume truly said, 
‘The raising of a house or a ship into the air is a 
visible miracle. The raising of a feather, when the 


* ‘Essays on Religion,’ p. 212. 


152 The Mystery of God. 


wind wants ever so little of a force requisite for that 
“purpose, is as real a miracle, though not so sensible 
with regard to us.* It matters not how minute the 
occurrence: an event is a miracle if the usual physical 
causation be absent, and an effect be produced inside 
the order of nature by a Divine act. The smallest 
answer to prayer is as truly excluded by the philosophic 
arguments against miracles, if those arguments are 
valid, as the raising of Lazarus or the stilling of the 
tempest. Overlooking this fact, some Theists venture 
to sling Atheistic stones at the miracles of Christianity, 
while calling God their Father, continuing to pray, 
and rejoicing in His spiritual presence, vainly imagining 
that Christianity minus its miracles would be practically 
the same religion, only more easily believed. Others 
think to evade all philosophic and scientific difficultics 
by praying only for things spiritual, leaving physical 
benefits, e.g. the bread referred to in the Lord’s 
Prayer, to be asked for by unscientific persons. This 
attempt, however, only excites ridicule among the 
high priests of Materialism. The introduction of a 
single reviving thought or purifying impulse direct 
from God involves precisely the same usage of Divine 
Will within the order of nature as the revelation of a 
moral code to Moses on Mount Sinai. The least 
influence brought to bear on a human mind from 
outside, or above the order of natural sequences, 
involves a modification of that order, and must be 
attended with physical consequences. The mere 
reception of a new emotion, or a quickened apprehen- 
sion, or an enlivened hope into the. mind, induces an 
* ‘Essays, Note K, Vol. II., p. 462. 


a 


SRE = "tie 


The Miracle of Revelation. 153 


e) 


instantaneous physical change. The altered counten- 
ance of one who prays, and in his prayer obtains relief 
from shame or grief, indicates a countless number of 
molecular changes; and if it be a fact that God has 
really responded to the man’s cry, and sent a little 
strength into his soul, a new force has come into the 
realm of natural order—a force which may work out 
eventually into a revolution like that of Luther, and 
change the custom of the world. It matters not, then, 
how secret or spiritual the communion; the argument 
from physical continuity against a miraculous revelation 
is gone when once the will of God has been confessed 
to act directly on the mind of man. The least faith 
in a prayer-answering God involves the same philo- 
sophic and scientific difficulties as the inspiration of a 
prophet or the resurrection of Christ. When a single 
act of Divine volition has been admitted, it can never 
afterwards be contended that such volitions are im- 
possible, or on abstract grounds incredible. 

The first argument claiming our attention is that of 
David Hume, as advanced in his famous Essay to 
prove that ‘no evidence whatever could suffice to render 
a miracle credible.* He contended that a miracle is 
contrary to the ‘firm,’ ‘unalterable,’ and ‘ uniform 
experience’ of mankind; that this ‘experience’ is ‘a 
direct and full proof from the nature of the fact 
against the existence of any miracle,’ and that there- 
fore ‘no testimony is sufficient to establish a miracle.’ 
This argument was launched with high-sounding words 
of self-congratulation by its author. ‘I flatter myself,’ 
he wrote, ‘that I have discovered an argument, ..- - 


* ‘Essays,’ Vol. II., p. 109. 


154 The Mystery of God. 


which, if just, will, with the wise and learned, be an 
everlasting check to all kinds of superstitious delusion, 
and consequently will be useful as long as the world 
endures.’ Competent judges, including many who 
sympathize with Hume’s attitude towards Christianity, 
have long since perceived that his argument against 
miracles is simply an ingenious begging of the whole 
question. It is, however, still lauded and repeated as 
if its soundness were above suspicion, and a few words 
must be devoted to its examination. 

A great fallacy which runs through the essay may 
be detected in Hume’s account of the manner in which 
his argument was conceived. He states that it was 
suggested to him by reading Tillotson’s refutation of 
the Romanist doctrine of transubstantiation in the 
Lord’s supper. Tillotson argued that the evidence of 
our senses is stronger than, and must be believed in 
preference to, any testimony. But, said he, the 
evidences of the Christian religion rest on testimony ; 
consequently, inasmuch as the doctrine of the Real 
Presence contradicts our senses, we ought not to 
believe it, even if it be a doctrine of Christianity. 
Hume has gained fame by simply extending this 
argument to all the alleged miracles of the Bible. 
But it is singular how so acute an intellect should 
have failed to see that the reasoning which for Tillot- 
son’s purpose was valid, was worthless for his own. 
The minor premise, which is true respecting the dogma 
of the Real Presence in the Mass, is false respecting 
the miracles of the Bible. The dogma of the Real 
Presence does contradict our senses. The senses of 
every human being who beholds the Mass performed 


The Miracle of Revelation. 155 


tell him that the bread and wine show no signs of 
alteration—even a chemist can find no accident or 
property removed or added. But the Roman Church 
asserts that the bread and wine are annihilated, and 
the real flesh and blood of Christ are there instead, 
despite the evidences of touch, taste, smell, and sight, 
and in defiance of chemical analysis. But what alleged 
miracle of Scripture can be charged with contradicting 
our senses or the senses of the original observers ? 
Were the wedding-guests at Cana asked to believe 
that they were drinking good wine while their senses 
told them it was only spring water? Was the widow 
of Nain asked to believe that she had her son alive 
again while his body lay stark and stiff on the bier ? 
Did the disciples convulse Jerusalem by saying ‘ Jesus 
has risen,’ in spite of the production of His mangled 
and decaying body by the rulers and priests? Clearly 
not. These miracles, as they are described to us, all 
appealed to men’s senses as witnesses of the phenomena; 
and the difficulty felt by sceptics in regard to them is 
the exact opposite of that which Tillotson urged so 
successfully against the doctrine of the Mass. The 
Christian witnesses say that certain marvellous 
physical phenomena appeared to them which no 
known physical causes could produce. The Romish 
Church says, ‘ There are no physical phenomena to be 
observed, but in spite of that a physical change has 
taken place.’* 


* A Roman Catholic may urge that if a miracle can be wrought 
to produce exceptional phenomena, it can also be wrought to effect 
a change of substance while the accidents remain. A variety of 
points are raised by this contention which belong exclusively to 
Protestant polemics. It may not, however, be superfluous to re- 


156 Lhe Mystery of God. 


A second fallacy in Hume’s essay is equally palpable. 
' He avers that miracles are contrary to experience. 
But we inquire to whose experience are they con- 
trary? To Mr. Hume’s? Yes; but not therefore 
to all mankind’s. How then are we to know what 
the experience of mankind has been? Evidently 
only by recorded testimony. But what portion of 
mankind has left us any testimony on the subject at 
all? Certainly only a small portion, although the 
individuals are numerous. Have, then, any of these 
witnesses professed to have seen miracles? Most 
certainly, for that is how most of them were induced 
to testify on the subject at all. Manifestly, therefore, 
before we can affirm what the uniform experience of 
mankind has been, we must consider the worth of this 
testimony and decide whether it be good or bad. This 
is the conclusion arrived at by Mill, who says that, ‘ All 
the evidence alleged in favour of any miracle ought to 
be reckoned as counter evidence in refutation of the 
ground on which it is asserted that miracles ought to 
be disbelieved. The question can only be stated fairly 
as depending on a balance of evidence.’ 

Having reached this point, we might perhaps claim 


mark that such a view presupposes the existence of miracles, and 
can in no way affect the force of the argument against Hume. If 
miracles are wrought upon substance without affecting accidents, 
they lie outside the range of sense perceptions, and consequently of 
human testimony. If believed in at all, they are the objects of a 
faith which not only asks no support from the senses, but can 
survive their contradiction. Hume’s mistake was that he con- 
founded two radically different classes of alleged miracles, as pointed 
out in the text. Nota sentence of what he writes respecting the 
teachings of experience or the value of testimony has the slightest 
relevance to miracles of an invisible order. 


The Miracle of Revelation. 157 


that the way is sufficiently cleared of a priori objections 
for an unprejudiced discussion of the evidences relied 
upon by Christianity. We have Mill’s admissions, that, 
(1) Given a Divine Creator, a miraculous revelation is 
possible ; (2) if He cared at all for His creatures there 
is no antecedent improbability against His making such 
a communication; (3) the question is solely one of 
evidence; (4) this question cannot be closed by such 
dogmatic assertions as Hume’s. But notwithstanding 
these admissions Mill seeks to find logical room for 
two further contentions: (1) That the actual evidence 
adduced in favour of alleged miracles having been 
wrought is insufficient; (2) that there is a vast pre- 
ponderance of probability against such a direct action 
ever taking place. 

It will be observed that the first of these contentions 
raises a far larger issue than Mill announced in the 
opening of his essay. It arraigns the whole of those 
‘positive evidences of the Christian’ religion which he 
expressly excluded from treatment. Whether his ac- 
quaintance with Christian apologetics was sufficient to 
qualify him for the task of discussing them may well be 
doubted. As a matter of fact, however, he does not 
discuss them in any of his essays. The value of these 
particular evidences will hereafter be submitted to 
examination, and the adverse opinions casually ex- 
pressed in his Essay on Theism will be dealt with as 
more fully expressed and sustained by other writers. 
Declining all excursions, therefore, beyond the boundaries 
assigned for this chapter, we shall consider only his 
remarks on the general worth of evidence in relation to 
alleged Divine acts. 


158 The Mystery of God. 


His general position is ‘that Divine interference with 
nature could be proved if we had the same sort of 
evidence for it which we have for human interferences’ 
(p. 228). Near the commencement of his essay, he 
writes very distinctly on this point. ‘Taking the 
question from the very beginning,’ he observes, ‘it is 
evidently impossible to maintain that if a supernatural 
fact really occurs, proof of its occurrence cannot be 
accessible to the human faculties. The evidence of our 
senses could prove this, as it can prove other things. 
To put the most extreme case: suppose that I actually 
saw and heard a Being, either of the human form or of 
some form previously unknown to me, commanding a 
world to exist, and a new world actually starting into 
existence and commencing a movement through space, 
at his command. There can be no doubt that this 
evidence would convert the creation of worlds from a 
speculation into a fact of experience’ (p. 217). He antici- 
pates the sceptical objection that the appearance might 
be no ‘ more than an hallucination’ of his senses, but, 
admitting the possibility that the senses may be de- 
ceived, he urges that there are various precautions 
which may be taken, and draws the practical con- 
clusion: ‘ When the evidence, on which an opinion 
rests, is equal to that upon which the whole conduct 
and safety of our lives is founded, we need ask no 
further. Objections which apply equally to all evidence 
are valid against none. They only prove abstract 
fallibility’ (p. 218). 

This passage is of great importance. It shows that 
we are foolish to demand evidence of a surer kind than 
our human faculties are capable of supplying. It admits 


The Miracle of Revelation. 159 


that the spectators of a superhuman event would be 
justified in trusting to their own senses, and it leaves 
the way open for a discussion of the question, whether 
we are also justified in trusting to the testimony of 
those who say, ‘ We have seen such events.’ This is 
precisely what Mill perceived, for his next paragraph 
introduces the question of human testimony. In the 
midst, however, of the discussion of this topic, the 
trustworthiness of the senses is impugned in a re- 
markable passage which, to all but very subtle in- 
tellects, will appear a contradiction of the words given 
above. 

The passage now to be quoted occurs directly after 
the admission that a Divine interference with nature 
could be proved if we had the same sort of evidence for 
it which we have for human interferences. Its object 
is to destroy the value of that admission by showing 
that such evidence must always be lacking. ‘When 
the human will interferes to produce any physical 
phenomenon, except the movements of the human body, 
it does so by the employment of means : and is obliged 
to employ such means as are by their own physical 
properties sufficient to bring about the effect. Divine 
interference, by hypothesis, proceeds in a different 
manner from this: it produces its effect without means, 
or with such as are in themselves insufficient ’ (p. 228). 
Therefore it is urged, ‘ Supposing even that the event, 
supposed to be miraculous, does not reach us through 
the uncertain medium of human testimony, but rests on 
the direct evidence of our senses; even then, so long 
as there is no direct evidence of its production by a 
Divine volition, like that we have for the production of 


160 Lhe Mystery of God. 


bodily movements by human volitions’ (p. 229), so 
long the hypothesis of Divine volitions is incredible. 
This has been much admired as a piece of close and 
powerful reasoning ; let us judge it for ourselves. Ob- 
serve, first of all, that to point the contrast between 
Divine and human volitions it is affirmed that God 
uses means, if He uses them at all, which are ‘ in them- 
selves insufficient,’ but man uses means which are ‘ by 
their own physical properties sufficient.’ But the ques- 
tion arises, Does man use means whichare in themselves 
sufficient to produce the effect? Are any implements 
employed by man to effect his purposes in external 
nature ‘sufficient by their own physical properties ’ to 
produce their desired effect, apart from the volition 
which uses them? If so, we should be glad to make 
their acquaintance. Willa lancet open sore flesh unless 
used by man? or will a sail set itself to catch a sea- 
breeze? or a gun by its own ‘physical properties’ 
direct and propel a shot? The question of the suffi- 
ciency of means largely depends on the force of will and 
the degree of wisdom possessed by the person who 
employs them. With a common pen-knife some men 
could carve a better model ship than others could make 
with the best tools ever invented at their command. 
The word ‘sufficient,’ as applied to means, is a purely 
relative term, and it is relative not only to the effect 
required, but also to the power and skill of the being 
who employs the means. Therefore, if God can pro- 
duce effects by means which would be insufficient in 
man’s hands, it only shows that He is mightier and 
wiser than man, but in no case, human or Divine, can 
means be called insufficient, if they really suffice for the 


The Miracle of Revelation. 161 


production of the required effect, and in neither case 
are the means used ‘sufficient’ in themselves or ‘ by 
their own physical properties.’ 

Observe again the singular distinction set up between | 
the movements of the human body by the will and the 
production of any other physical phenomena. We are 
invited to assume that in moving the body the will uses 
no physical means, while in every other case it is com- 
pelled to employ them. But what are the facts ? Inthe 
first place the willnever uses any external physical means 
or instruments except by and through some movements 
of the body. When Mill wrote that sentence, he used 
perhaps a quill; but the said quill had first to be taken 
hold of by a hand, and never formed a letter except as 
guided by the writer’s fingers. The blacksmith, per- 
spiring at his task of shaping jron’on the anvil, would 
gladly use his ponderous hammer without the fatigue 
of moving his arms. The seamstress, stitching garments 
with aching eyes and trembling fingers, would most 
thankfully ply her needle by a calm exertion of the will. 
But, alas for toiling humanity ! the will has no power to 
produce any physical effects, or to employ any physical 
means, whether small or great, except through and by 
the prior means of moving some portion of the body. 

In spite of Mill’s mysterious slip of thought, therefore, 
we are driven inside man’s body to discover how the 
will operates. Here again we are compelled to point 
out an inexcusable assumption of what is manifestly 
incorrect. We are invited to believe that, in producing 
movements of the body, the will employs no physical 
means. To what extent is this true? It isnot true of 
the hand, for no man, author or smith, can use his 

Tt 


162 Lhe Mystery of God. 


hand to wield an implement without setting in motion 
a considerable amount of physical machinery. Let a 
few nerves and muscles be cut in the arm, or a bone be 
broken, or a joint dislocated, and the strongest will 
can neither close,the empty fingers nor grasp a hammer 
ora pen. Step by step we trace the machinery of the 
body back to the brain cells. There at last, but only 
there, we find physical phenomena. produced by the 
will without the use of any intermediate physical means. 
Whatever the ultimate effect to be produced, whether 
within the body or out of the body, whether to write a 
book, steer a ship, build a tower, or only to snap the 
fingers, the will operates in the same way. There is 
absolutely no distinction, and the subtle argument 
based upon the assumption that man’s will operates 
in two different ways is a logical castle in the air. 

Having cleared our minds of this confusion, we are 
free to take the value of Mill’s admission, ‘that divine 
interference with nature could be proved if we had the 
same sort of evidence for it which we have for human 
interferences.’ The case, therefore, stands thus. Apart 
from testimony, we have two sorts of evidence for 
human interferences : 

I. We have the evidence of consciousness which each 
man possesses that his own body is moved by an effort 
of his will. This order of evidence never can be pro- 
ducible for a Divine act of volition. If at any time 
God works a miracle, He alone can be conscious of 
performing it. If myriads of men or angels were to 
witness the creation of a new world in the manner 
described by Mill, they would not have the same kind 
of certitude that we have about our own volitions. 


The Miracle of Revelation. 163 


This, however, does not weaken the force of any 
evidence for miracles, because the objection applies 
with equal force to the evidence of the smallest human 
action that can be witnessed. 

II. Apart from the evidence of consciousness or 
testimony, we have, also, for human interferences with 
nature, the evidence of inference, and that more or less 
‘speculative inference. We have ‘direct perception ’ 
of phenomena produced by the volition, but never. of 
the volition itself. If I seea man stabbed immediately 
before me in broad daylight, I can only infer a human 
volition. The evidence adduced in cases of wilful 
murder is always inferential, even when it is not what 
is called ‘circumstantial.’ My senses report to my 
intellect the observed phenomena. Reflecting on these, 
I am compelled to infer that they have a real cause, 
and the only cause I can conceive is that the body I 
see at work is moved by an invisible will like to that of 
which I am conscious, but which no man can see in 
me. This is the sole evidence I can obtain of any 
human will interfering with nature. It is generally 
accounted valid. The world passes on its way regard- 
ing it as sufficient. Men are hanged on the strength 
of such evidence. Wars are waged, families dwell 
together, and business is conducted in the faith of it. 
To disregard it would involve an absolute cessation of 
human intercourse, and drive us into the old Hindoo 
jungle of calling the universe an illusion. Yet the 
evidence for a Divine interference. would be of a 
similar order. If I beheld a new world created as 
Mill describes, I should only have the evidence of my 
senses for the outward phenomena and the super- 

Phase 


164 Lhe Mystery of God. 


human volition would be an ‘inference.’ If Mary 
really stood by the grave of Lazarus and saw her dead 
brother arise, her senses would render precisely the 
Same service as when she saw him buried a few days 
before, and they would be neither more nor less trust- 
worthy in the one case than the other. Any objection 
against the evidence in this or similar instances on the 
score of its being only ‘ inferential’ would apply to ‘all 
evidence’ whatever. The justice of an inference must 
in all cases be open to consideration. No one would 
contend that every conclusion to which an incautious 
mind may leap is to be accepted as valid. But the 
question now before us relates not to a concrete case 
but to the qualities of evidence in general and in par- 
ticular to the value of aninference per se. In the case 
supposed by Mill, he admits that the true inference 
would be that a Divine volition had taken place, and 
thus unwittingly allows the sufficiency of inference in 
a conceivable case. If he sawa dead man raised from 
the grave he would probably make the same admission. 
The actual occurrence of either event would be an 
object of direct perception, and the inference drawn 
from it would be an act of the reason. It is insisted, 
therefore, that the reason must be called upon to decide 
in each particular case as to what inference is to be 
drawn from observed facts, and no 4 priori objection can 
hold good against any such conclusion merely because 
it is an inference. Such an objection would force 
us to doubt the existence of the world, the reality of 
any action done for us by a mother or wife or child, 
and so would reduce thought itself to a lying dream. 
We fall back, therefore, again on Mill’s twofold admis- 


The Miracle of Revelation. 165 


sion, that ‘divine interference with nature could be 
proved if we had the same sort of evidence for it which 
we have for human interferences,’ and, ‘when the 
evidence on which an opinion rests is equal to that 
upon which the whole conduct and safety of our lives 
is founded, we need ask no further. Objections which 
apply equally to all evidence are valid against none. 
They only prove abstract fallibility.’ 

We advance now to consider the value of human 
testimony as evidence of a superhuman interference 
with nature. Granting that we should be justified in 
trusting our senses as already ascertained, it is obvious 
that such evidence can seldom be available. The 
world wants to know whether it is entitled to credit 
the reports of ancient events, such as are recorded 
in the Bible. Here again it must be remarked 
that the examination of particular testimonies is re- 
served. We have now to deal with the prior question 
raised by scepticism. Can such testimony ever be 
accepted ? 

In estimating the value of testimony, it is necessary 
to distinguish between the phenomena attested and 
the inference drawn. Testimony, strictly speaking, 
can never transcend the evidence of consciousness, or 
of the senses. The senses, as we have seen, cannot 
discern a volition, therefore no testimony can directly 
prove one, unless it be given by the person who exer- 
cised his will. All we can ask of a witness is that he will 
accurately report what he perceived. When this is 
done, we are in a position to draw an inference our- 
selves. We may often have to repudiate an inference 
as unsound, while accepting a statement of facts as 


166 The Mystery of God. 


true. Indeed, we not unfrequently use the facts 
related by a writer to discredit his inferences. 

Keeping this ‘distinction in mind, it will appear that 
human testimony is at least as trustworthy as the 
evidence of our senses. In the present day, we have 
learned to correct the evidence of our senses as to 
matter of fact in countless instances by accepting the 
testimony of other observers. We deny the witness 
of our eyes that the sun rises and sets, yet how many 
of us have personally made the observations which 
prove our eyes mistaken? The facts of geology and 
astronomy, and indeed of all the natural sciences, are 
received for the greater part on testimony. Indeed, 
the amount of knowledge obtained by any one man’s 
senses is infinitesimally small in comparison with what 
he credits on the evidence of his fellows. If a sceptic 
should contend that ‘all men are liars,’ he would be 
obliged to base even that assertion on testimony. 

Of course it has to be admitted that we may be 
deceived by testimony as well as by the senses. 
Our witnesses may have been under some illusion, 
or they may have intentionally borne false witness. 
But then we are entitled to transfer to this kind of 
evidence what Mill so justly admitted about the 
senses. There are well-known precautions which may 
be taken to test the veracity and discretion of a wit- 
ness; but in the majority of cases testimony, and not 
the senses, is ‘all that we have to trust to.’ ‘We 
depend on’ it ‘for the premises’ of our reasonings in 
physical and historical science, and in all the relation- 
ships of life. Upon the strength of it justice is 
administered, not by eye-witnesses of crime, but by 


The Miracle of Revelation. 167 


impartial judges, who are rightly trusted to sift the 
evidence adduced. If the fallibility of testimony be 
urged as an objection against the reception of evidence, 
we may fall back, therefore, with confidence on the 
sound dictum already quoted twice. ‘When the 
evidence on which an opinion rests is equal to that 
upon which the whole conduct and safety of our lives 
is founded, we need ask no further. Objections which 
apply equally to all evidence are valid against none. 
They only prove abstract fallibility.. The testimony 
of witnesses who profess to have seen occurrences 
which can only be explained by inferring a Divine act 
of volition, is of precisely the same order as that which 
we have for human actions. The testimony which 
would satisfy in the one case cannot on abstract 
grounds be held insufficient in the other; while of 
course the right or the duty of trying the soundness 
of any inference from the phenomena must in all cases 
remain. 

It may be conceded that our argument thus far is 
logically valid; and yet an impression remain that, as 
practical persons, we ought to regard testimony for 
extraordinary events with more caution than is con- 
sidered necessary in ordinary affairs. This is quite 
just. If a man’s life were in question, a counsel would 
cross-examine witnesses with more severity than if the 
issue at stake were a trifling sum of money. Where 
the truth of a religion is concerned, therefore, no pains 
can be too great, and no care excessive in weighing 
the evidence before us. It is, however, quite as 
important that this care should be taken before the 
evidence is rejected as before it is accepted, for a 


168 The Mystery of God. 


hasty denial must be at least as evil as a rash 
belief. 

Holding these views, I shall now ask the reader to 
consider the weight of probability for and against 
a Divine revelation before proceeding to examine the 
case for Christianity. Mill’s admission that such a 
revelation is not antecedently improbable has been 
cited. In spite of that admission, however, he contends 
that, judging from an observation of the Creator’s 
actual works and ways in nature, there is a great 
preponderance of probability against such an event 
taking place. ‘ Assuming,’ he observes, ‘as a fact the 
existence and providence of God, the whole of our 
observation of Nature proves to us by incontrovertible 
evidence that the rule of His government is by means 
of second causes; that all facts, or at least all physical 
facts, follow uniformly upon given physical conditions, 
and never occur but when the appropriate collection of 
physical conditions is realized. I limit this assertion 
to physical facts, in order to leave the case of human 
volition an open question: though, indeed, I need not 
do so; for if the human will is free, it has been left free 
by the Creator, and is not controlled by Him either 
through second causes or directly, so that, not being 
governed, it is not a specimen of His mode of 
government. Whatever He does govern, He governs 
by second causes’ (p. 233). 

Observe first of all the peculiar manner in which the 
analogy of the human will is set aside. ‘If the human 
will is free, it has been left free by the Creator, and is 
not controlled by Him.’ So far we must yield our assent. 
Taking the word ‘controlled’ to mean—as of course it 


The Miracle of Revelation. 169 


was used to mean—coerced, the sentence is a mere plati- 
tude. But note how that word ‘controlled’ slips out 
and the word ‘ governed’ is introduced in a subsequent 
clause, as if it meant the same thing. Not being 
controlled it is not governed, and so is ‘not a specimen 
of his mode of government.’ But why were these 
words interchanged? The word ‘governed’ is far 
wider than ‘controlled,’ and is consistent with the 
reign of one free agent over other free agents, which 
‘controlled’ is not. Would the champion of political 
liberty say that a nation is not governed unless it be 
despotically controlled? In a political treatise he 
would have flayed an Imperialist author who dared to 
confound such different terms. He would have asserted 
indignantly that one of the clearest and best marks of 
good government is that it does not withhold liberty. 
In any country where he found personal freedom 
established, he would regard that fact as one of the 
most significant specimens of the prevailing mode of 
government, and would contrast it with the absence of 
freedom elsewhere. The governing ofa free people is, 
indeed, the greatest function of all moral rulers; and 
the ability to wisely guide other wills without crushing 
them by fear or force is the mark of a heaven-born 
governor of men. All analogy therefore teaches us to 
say that the freedom of which we are conscious, and 
which no metaphysical subtleties can eradicate, is 
about the most important indication of God’s method 
of government which could be named, and it cannot 
be cast out of our argument by such an unpardonable 
substitution of the word ‘ govern’ in the conclusion of 
a syllogism for the word ‘controlled’ in the premises. 


170 Lhe Mystery of od. 


President Lincoln once observed in homely language 
that it is not wise to ‘swop horses when crossing a 
‘stream. It is often found a great convenience, how- 
ever, to change terms in getting over a logical difficulty. 

Keeping the human will in reserve for use whenever 
needed, let us turn our attention to the argument as 
limited.to ‘things physical.’ Strictly speaking, it is 
nothing but Hume’s argument served up again under a 
different colouring of words. ‘The whole of our ob- 
servation of nature proves to us by incontrovertible 
evidence that the rule of His government is by second 
causes.’ ‘All physical facts follow uniformly upon given 
physical conditions, and never occur otherwise.’ What 
is this but Hume’s ‘ uniform experience,’ renounced in 
the previous paragraph as an unwarrantable assump- 
tion, but instantly reproduced? The question raised by 
such language is properly one of fact, not of proba- 
bility; but we may judge from the close of the para- 
graph that Mill used the words ‘the whole of our 
observation’ to mean the observations of modern men 
of science and men of the world, and that he intended 
to set the uniformity of their observations against the 
testimony of any professed witnesses of miraculous 
events. Protesting against such a lax use of words on 
a subject so supremely demanding clear thought and 
speech, it has still to be insisted that when the pronoun 
‘our’ is thus limited to scientific observers and men of 
_ the world, the statement is incorrect. Science, as we 
have seen in previous chapters, is perfectly familiar 
with physical facts which had no such antecedent 
physical conditions as are generally observed to be 
necessary. The total quantity of energy in the uni- 


The Miracle of Revelation. 171 


verse is declared to be perpetually the same, but to be 
constantly tending towards lower forms of activity, and 
so towards an ultimate condition of stable equilibrium. 
There was a time when this energy was in a maximum 
condition of activity. How then was that maximum 
reached when the law of nature is for it to decline 
towards a minimum and to become nil? Mathematics 
prove the facts, but natural laws, as at present known, 
can give us no hint respecting the physical antece- 
dents of that maximum of kinetic energy. Coming 
down to things less remote, the first particle of living 
matter was a physical fact without the now invariable 
antecedent condition of previous physical life. This 
first bit of bioplasm must have proceeded from not- 
living matter, either by creation or by evolution, but mM 
either case the now invariable physical antecedents were 
confessedly not there. We are told that not more than 
12,000,000 years ago the earth was too hot for animal 
or vegetable life to exist upon it. According to any 
theory of progress, what millions of physical facts must 
have come into existence in that period without the 
now usual antecedent conditions! From whatever 
point of nature we start in our observation, science 
leads us up by inexorable steps to a point where the 
so-called ‘appropriate collection of physical conditions’ 
was demonstrably absent. The weight of scientific 
observations therefore which Mill strove to put into the 
balances against the probability of an event ever 
happening without these conditions, falls from his hand, 
and by a righteous retribution it drops into the other 
scale. ; 

The most forcible argument ever framed against the 


172 Lhe Mystery of God. 


probability of a miracle being wrought is that based on 
the doctrine of continuity. It is insisted that any break 
in the continuity of nature must tend to confound 
man’s mind, to confuse his calculations, and render un- 
certain the operation of those forces which, if variable, 
would destroy confidence and security in action. For 
example, if to save the life of a saint the law of gravita- 
tion were superseded, it is asked, How could we reckon 
on that law in building or walking or for any other 
purpose? If the sun were stayed in its course, how 
could astronomers ever again calculate the motions of 
the solar system? Would not all the ordinances of 
time be disturbed, and the truth of all our knowledge 
of past and future ages be rendered doubtful ? 

This plea is very weighty, because it involves a moral 
consideration. It deals with the world not merely as 
a machine, and in the spirit of a mechanic, but in the 
spirit of one who believes the universe the domain of a 
God who is not only living, but true, and is faithful in 
all His works. It is certainly incredible that He who 
made us will ever do anything to undermine our trust 
in the reign of law. He will never make the universe 
speak an untruth to our intellects; and we may lay it 
down as an axiom that, should He ever exercise His 
will in a direct manner, He will so do it as to promote 
truth and confidence among His creatures, and not so 
as to confound them. 

But what does this mean, and to what conclusions 
does it conduct? Does it mean that God cannot 
exercise His will without producing error in our 
thoughts? Does it mean that, having set worlds in 
motion, He must leave them to go on in monotonous 


The Miracle of Revelation. ype 


sameness for ever, lest His creatures should be per- 
plexed? If that be so, the facts of the world do not 
correspond to such an expectation. These facts scarcely 
indicate that the Creator intended us to have no un- 
certainties about the physical conditions and environ- 
ment of life. It rather appears that uncertainty is the 
law of our being; so that literally we cannot tell what 
a day or an hour may bring forth. Who can tell 
whether to-morrow the earth may not open under his 
feet and swallow down the city in which he dwells, or 
fire descend from the clouds to consume his house, 
or winds sweep away his ships, or disease cause his 
calculations to fail and his plans to perish? Even in 
the matter of time, man never has had anything but 
an approximate degree of accuracy, and calculations 
on which life and property depend are frequently 
baffled by inexplicable events. Whatever took place 
when Israel fought against Amalek, it is certain that 
since man began to watch the heavens, suns have been 
stayed in their course, and some day, unless perchance 
a miracle be wrought, all the measurements and calcu- 
lations of time in this solar system will assuredly come 
to grief. Already the word ‘day’ means double the 
duration that it did once on our globe. Every day we 
live, the earth takes a little longer to revolve upon its 
axis than it did the day before, and should it fall into 
the sun, as many anticipate, all the time-tables of 
Jupiter, and the other planets of our solar system (if 
these still exist), will suddenly go wrong. 

But is God, then, the author of confusion because of 
these things? Clearly not. They can only be held to 
prove Him the Author of an order too vast and complex 


174 The Mystery of God. 


for man’s mind to master. If from some intellectual 
altitude we could survey the events of ‘eternal times’ 
in their relative proportions, as we see the events of 
days and hours: if we could comprehend in our glance 
the history of worlds as we now survey the growth and 
decay of cities and families, all apparent exceptions 
would no doubt fall into their places as parts of a 
sublime order; and those events which are fitted to 
baffle our intellects and confuse our calculations as 
children of a few days, might be recognised as the 
striking of the clock of ages, marking off measured 
periods wherein millions of years are as one day, and 
the life of a world as a watch in the night. Of all this 
I entertain no doubt; but its true significance is that 
the universe is not so constructed, and its operations 
are not so restricted, as to be always clear and certain 
to man’s mind. . 

Things that are usual and ordinary to one who 
measures epochs by ages, will appear breaches of order 
when they happen within the observation of one who 
measures time by minutes and months, and whose 
memory stretches only over a few brief earthly years. 
If we were acquainted with some millions of worlds, it 
might appear that variations of method, such as we 
call miraculous, occur at intervals in the educational 
progress of innumerable races of moral beings, and that 
they are parts of an invariable order for the universe, 
although exceptional in the experience of each race 
apart. But, whatever may be thought of this sup- 
position, it is surely idle, while we dwell in the midst 
of so many mysteries and incalculable processes, to 
contend that a few exceptional events, whether brought 


The Miracle of Revelation. 175 


about by natural laws or by direct Divine volitions, 
would appreciably affect the certainty of our knowledge. 
Especially must it be vain to allege that such events 
would exercise an unfavourable influence on our sense 
of security in doing work or taking rest, if we regard 
them as. Divine acts wrought for our moral and intel- 
lectual enlightenment, and to promote faith in the 
personal care of. Him who made the heavens and the 
earth. 7 

These considerations are fitted, at least, to weaken 
the force of the argument from continuity against the 
probability of a miracle; but that argument may be 
turned round to show a high degree of probability, 
almost the moral certainty, that the God who made 
mankind will continue to exert His will directly in their 
affairs. Jesus Christ proclaimed the sublimest law of 
continuity when He said that the heavens and the 
earth should pass away before one jot or one tittle of 
God’s will for moral beings should be annulled. And 
again when He said, ‘ My Father worketh until now’ 
(John v. 17). These statements are not offered here as 
authoritative revelations of fact. Weare not entitled 
to so employ them in this argument; but the most 
sceptical may bestow upon them the same respectful 
attention as they would give to words spoken at a 
meeting of the British Association. Considering them, 
therefore, in this light, we have a marvellous doctrine 
of continuity: a continuity of Divine activity which 
never pauses and never varies in its purpose, whether 
making worlds or causing them to perish; a continuity 
which is never broken by any treatment of the physical 
universe, however remarkable, which subserves the 


176 The Mystery of God. 


discipline of moral beings, and so supports the ad- 
ministration of unchanging and unchangeable Moral 
Laws. This is the only doctrine of continuity ever 
propounded that covers all the universe in space, all 
eternity in duration, and includes the moral history and 
discipline of mankind. A miracle involves no breach, 
even of physical continuity, if all events are thus viewed 
as the outworking of Divine energy. Physical con- 
tinuity is preserved throughout the most erratic and 
extraordinary actions of men, because man’s will, 
though not a physical cause, is a recognised and con- 
stant cause of physical changes. So if miracles are 
understood to be the production of a Divine will which 
is always at work, the mere variation of the phenomena, 
or the order of phenomena, leaves continuity unim- 
paired. 

On the other hand, a marvellous breach of con- 
tinuity is involved in the theory that God worked as 
the Creator by the forthputting of His will, but then 
straightway ceased to work at all! It admits that for 
a certain time He was actively engaged in operations 
upon matter, producing molecules and setting them in 
motion, and appointing the laws of their combination. 
He was so minute in His care that He provided for 
creatures man’s microscopic instruments cannot dis- 
cover, and put these things—millions of which may 
live in a drop of water—into endless relations with 
suns and systems and with man’s happiness and 
welfare. Having done this, we are asked to believe 
that He ceases to touch matter any more! Is not this 
a breach of continuity! It involves so complete a 
change of character and of relation to the substance of 


Lhe Miracle of Revelation. 189 


the cosmos, that the God of solicitude and care revealed 
in creation is not the same Being as the God who holds - 
aloof for evermore ! 3 

When we come thus to apply the doctrine of con- 
tinuity to the ways and character of God, a multitude 
of considerations arise. 

Creation involves duties, just as parentage does, but 
of a far more onerous and urgent kind. True, there is © 
no being higher than the Creator to enforce them by 
penal sanctions. But the Highest must be one whose 
nature spontaneously rejoices to do all, and far more 
than all, that any inferior nature can recognise as right. 
On such a point as this, not only the intellect but the 
heart is entitled to be heard, and the verdict of our 
hearts is clear. The mother who bears an infant is 
not just to her child when she casts it on a doorstep to 
struggle for existence, to perish or survive. What, 
then, would be the character of One who madesuch a 
being as man and then left him to struggle unaided on 
this ‘stony-hearted stepmother,’ the earth ? Here isa 
being with a will which can operate within the realm 
of physical order. He can so obey natural laws as to 
command nature with increasing kingliness; he can 
apply her forces to the most diabolical purposes; he 
can set forests on fire with two bits of stick; he can 
poison springs, and pollute rivers, and explode mines ; 
he can torture animals, maim and lacerate his neigh- 
bours, and put an end to his own earthly existence. 
All these things he can and will do ; but God, who has 
produced this volitional being, is supposed to Say, 
‘I will no more do My own will on earth’! phlevbas 
worked to produce, but He will not work to put 

| 12 


178 The Mystery of God. 


bounds to this creature’s excesses, to overrule, to teach, 
or to reconcile this rebellious and terrible being to 
His wisdom and goodness. Such an abdication of 
governing powers as is thus assumed would involve a 
crime against Himself and against His creation. If 
God were capable of such abandonment, there would 
be an awful impeachment in Job’s cry of reproach, 
‘Thine hands have framed me and fashioned me to- 
gether round about; yet Thou dost destroy me’ (Job 
x. 8). How much sublimer, and how much more con- 
sistent with continuity, is the faith which is breathed in 
David’s song, ‘The Lord will perfect that which con- 
cerneth me: Thy mercy, O Lord, endureth for ever ; 
forsake not the works of Thine own hands’ (Ps. 
exxxyiil..8). 

We may now take one other step, and see how 
highly probable this renders it, that God, if always 
working and sustaining all things by the same will 
which made them, should at certain periods so exert 
His will as to reveal both the fact that He really is at 
work, and the spirit and purpose of all His ordinary 
operations: 

We have agreed that the Author of Nature will not con- 
found our intellects. But, if God be always acting, does 
not the appearance of unbroken uniformity in physical 
Nature become a source of illusion and untruth to men? 
Tennyson sings: ‘God fulfils Himself in many ways, 
lest one good custom should corrupt the world.’ Is 
there not a profound suggestion here? If there be 
such a God as we have seen reason to believe, one long 
custom might deceive the world into thinking there is 
no Worker at all! In spite of all the alleged miracles 


The Miracle of Revelation. 179 


of revelation, and the inexplicable events observed by 
science, men do infer the non-existence or the non- 
activity of God from the measure of uniformity they 
perceive. Would it not tend to cure this confusion 
of mind if God condescended to work a miracle of 
self-revelation? If continued life be the law for all 
human beings, would not a visible resurrection remove 
a false inference drawn from the general uniformity 
with which bodies remain in their graves ?—would it 
not be corrective of some disastrously false calculations 
based on the supposition that death makes an end of 
all, and that there is no judgment to be looked for 
hereafter? If kindness be the law of God’s treat- 
ment of men, would not a few visible samples of 
His mercy assist a true faith in danger of being con- 
founded by the prevalence of disease? If active sym- 
pathy with man be the real condition of God’s mind, 
would not the revelation of such sympathy in a 
personal form be the dissipation of a false impression 
derived from the non-appearance of any superior Being 
to care for the inhabitants of a mechanical world ? 
If, in spite of all human sin and misery and appa- 
rent failure, God is working out a plan which will 
bring in everlasting righteousness, would it not pro- 
mote that result, and remove an intellectual confusion 
which is fitted to paralyze man’s moral endeavours, 
if God were to grant a special disclosure of His pur- 
pose, and were to afford, by works no human might 
could perform, some illustration of His own power to 
us-ward, and thus indirectly also some assurance that 
- the message was no cunningly-devised fable, but a true 
word from Himself, and worthy of universal faith ? 
EAs Zi 


120 The Mystery of God. 


Of course these are all advanced as suppositions, not 
as dogmatic assertions. But this in no way lessens 
their logical force for the purpose in hand. We started 
in this chapter on the hypothesis of a beneficent 
Creator, and have recorded Mill’s admissions that on 
this supposition it is neither impossible nor ante- 
cedently improbable that He will use His power to 
enlighten His creatures and assist them in the diffi- 
culties of life; and that the question whether He has 
done so is solely one of evidence and cannot be disposed 
of by Hume’s summary method. Reserving for separate 
discussion the particular evidences of the Christian 
belief, we have examined the worth of evidence in 
general, and have found that no objections can be sus- 
tained against the value of testimony in the case of an 
alleged miracle which do not ‘apply equally to all 
evidence,’ and that, therefore, none are valid. The 
last difficulty raised by philosophy is an allegation of 
improbability based upon an observation of the Creator’s 
usual ways. This improbability has disappeared under 
examination, and we have seen on the contrary that 
such a revelation as was not antecedently improbable is 
highly probable, and morally necessary if the Creator’s 
goodness is to be sustained. It is submitted, therefore, 
that a Christian who believes that God has spoken, 
entertains a faith which can only be shaken by direct 
evidence of untruth in the witnesses who have given 
their testimony to the world, or by such credible 
explanations of the phenomena they attest as shall 
suffice to set aside the inference drawn by the witnesses 
themselves, and accepted as reasonable by a large 
- portion of mankind. 


CHAPTER, VII. 
THE ORACLES OF GOD. 


For those who assent to the conclusions already 
reached, some of the main difficulties which hinder 
faith in the Bible as a treasury of Divine oracles are 
removed, and libraries of hostile criticism are deprived 
of their chief force. Many writers of high repute re- 
gard it as an axiom on which all criticisms must be 
based, that narratives which imply the possession of 
more than human knowledge, or the occurrence of 
events above the normal course of nature, are either to 
be explained away or denied. 

Kenan, in his ‘Life of Jesus,’ brushes the whole 
question aside by asserting, ‘That the gospels are in 
part legendary, is evident, since they are full of miracles 
and of the supernatural’ (p. 8). In his ‘ Apostles’ he 
is equally dogmatic, declaring that ‘it is an absolute 
rule of criticism to deny a place in history to narratives 
of miraculous circumstances’ (p. 27). Inthe same auto- 
cratic spirit Strauss only devotes two or three pages to 
the statement and vindication of the fundamental prin- 
ciples on which his work is based. His main contention 
is that ‘it is the problem of historical investigation, 
not merely to discover what has really taken place, but 
also the mode in which one thing has been caused by 


182 The Mystery of God. 


another. But History must renounce the latter most 
honorable part of her problem the moment she is ready 
to admit the existence of miracle, interrupting, as it 
does, the causation of one thing by another.’* He will 
hear no man’s testimony, for, ‘allowing the witnesses 
the best character,’ he declares ‘it is absolutely im- 
possible to conceive a case in which the investigator of 
history will not find it more probable, beyond all com- 
parison, that he has to deal with an untrue account 
rather than with a miraculous act’ (p. 200). To justify 
this attitude of invincible incredulity, he affirms that ‘all 
philosophical theories, in so far as they lay claim to 
the name of philosophy, are agreed.’ For Materialism 
and Pantheism, he justly observes, such things as 
miracles are impossible, because neither admits the 
existence of a God above nature. With regard to 
Theism, he concedes that: ‘We might be almost in- 
clined to suppose that miracles would seem conceivable 
and admissible to Theism with its personal God’ 
separate from the world. In fact, this theory has 
popular forms which might also admit the possibility 
of miracles ;’ but he ventures on the remarkable asser- 
tion that, ‘whenever it appears really as philosophy, it 
has always shown itself irreconcilable with miracles ” 
(p. 198). Passing lightly over this point, he proceeds to 
rest his case on Hume’s argument, of which he says 
that ‘it carries with it such general conviction, that the 
question may be regarded as having been by it virtually 
settled’ (p. 199). J. S. Mill was scarcely a preacher of 
‘Popular Theism,’ but we have seen his criticism of 
Hume’s argument, and his admission that on the 


* ‘ New Life of Jesus, Vol. I., p. 197. 


Lhe Oracles of God. ros 
Theistic hypothesis a miraculous revelation is mani- 
festly possible, and not antecedently improbable. We 
have also given reasons for an advance upon this 
admission, and for concluding that such a revelation is 
in the highest degree probable. We have also seen 
that if otherwise credible, Christianity presents a 
scheme of moral government which is well worthy of 
acceptance. We are, therefore, free as rational beings 
to acknowledge the presence of Divine oracles in the 


Bible, if its utterances commend themselves as from 
God. 


Section I.—The Place of a Book in Revelation. 


At this stage it may be advisable to offer a few 
thoughts on the fitness of a book to be an instrument 
of Divine revelation. 

Our observation of the Creator’s usual methods, and 
the special importance that seems to be attached to the 
independent, industrious, and faithful employment of 
man’s powers, does not favour the expectation that 
God, in making Himself known, will dispense with the 
use of our mental faculties. What man can do for 


himself, God evidently requires him to do. It is by 


this labour he lives, and by this struggle to live that he 
grows in wisdom and strength. God will scarcely work 
miracles to show what can be found by seeking. As 
our Teacher, He will surely adapt His methods to the 
education, 7.¢., the drawing out, of our natural talents, 
and will make our success as learners of truth to be 
conditioned by this progress. 

This principle, which, as distinct from its applica- 
tion, will scarcely be disputed, affects both the amount 


184 Lhe Mystery of God. 


and the manner of the revelation we may expect to 
receive. Whatever is necessary for man’s education 
over and above the things which are written in the 
conscience or are discoverable by the reason, God may 
be expected to impart. What these things are has 
already been seen in outline while considering the 
Christian scheme in relation to the Mystery of Evil. 
Paul defines them very. beautifully as ‘the things 
of God,’ which none knoweth ‘save the spirit of 
God’ (a Cor. i. 11). He institutes a comparison 
between these ‘things of God’ and ‘the things of a 
man,’ which none knoweth ‘save the spirit of the 
man which is in him.’ Apart from some revelation, 
we know nothing of what is passing in the conscious- 
ness of our fellow-men. Their countenances manifest 
a little, their works declare much more, but often these 
are inscrutable, and are grievously misunderstood until 
motives, intentions, and affections are explained by 
words. Without these words our greatest under- 
takings would become as impracticable as the tower of 
Babel, and social life would be impossible. If this be 
true with regard to human relations, must it not also 
be the case between men and God? His works in 
nature declare much of His mind, but history shows 
how wofully men misread them, and we have seen how 
even the wisest and best fail to gather from them a con- 
ception of God which can satisfy either the intellect or 
the heart. We see a little of what God has done and 
of what He is doing, but we cannot read the Why; 
and while ignorant of the purposes which lie hidden 
in the Creator’s mind, we are unable to appreciate His 
methods, or to cheerfully submit to His discipline, much 


The Oracles of God. 185 


less to co-operate with Him in the execution of His 
plans. Most reasonably, therefore, may we expect that 
He who made manasa social and conversational being 
will by some means speak to His creatures, and whisper 
the great secret of His eternal counsel so far as to 
render duty clear, and to bring those who hearken to 
His voice into a trustful and reverent relationship with 
Himself, 

As to the manner in which this communication will 
probably be made, it is only possible in this place to 
speak in the most general terms. In a world where 
everything is done by ‘little and little,’ we could not 
expect to have a complete revelation written in heaven 
- and sent down to this earth in its entirety, nor, as we 
have recognised, could such a communication have 
been understood. If God speaks to men it must be as 
a father reveals knowledge to his children, giving them 
“here a little and there a little,’ as their mental powers 
‘develop, as their advancing experience supplies them 
with language and ideas, and as their growing needs 
require. As to the vehicles for such communications, 
we can conceive of many that might be employed, and 
need not here discuss their nature. The question of 
present importance is, Should we expect God to give 
a separate and direct revelation of truth to each 
individual, and so to each generation afresh; or is it 
more reasonable to suppose that truth, once introduced 
into the realm of human knowledge, would be intrusted 
to man’s stewardship as the permanent property of 
the race? If we adopt the latter alternative as im- 
measurably the more reasonable hypothesis, the ques- 
tions arise, By what means can this knowledge be 


186 The Mystery of God. 


preserved ? How may it best be handed down through 
time, and spread abroad over the nations? How may 
it best be guarded against the risks of forgetfulness, 
perversion, and suppression? How may it most suit- 
ably be kept so as to allow of additions being made 
from time to time, and of eventual distribution among 
all people, so that each may have at his command the 
garnered wealth of ages? 

The answer which best satisfies all these questions is 
supplied by our common experience. Knowledge may 
be best preserved and diffused by putting it in writing. 
There are only two methods that can be named. 
Either oral tradition must be relied upon or there must 
be written’ documents. Unless a miracle of tongue- 
tying be wrought on each recipient of knowledge, 
tradition will be busy. But if this be the only mode of 
transmission, what risks of extinction must be run! 
And if these are overcome, what corruptions will ensue ! 
What lapses of memory, what softenings of unwelcome 
doctrine, what misstatements of things imperfectly 
understood, what additions of things deemed expedient 
or desirable, will occur! But written documents, if 
not immaculate at first, or altogether incorruptible by 
copyists, may, as we know, abide in substantially the 
same form for centuries, and continually be available 
as a standard whereby oral traditions may be tested, 
and thus be ‘profitable for teaching, for reproof, for 
correction, for instruction.’ What mischief tradition 
can work in a religious system may be seen in the 
Romish Church of the Middle Ages. What services 
written books can render is apparent in the Protestant 
Reformation, which, by appealing to the original 


Lhe Oracles of God. 187 


sources of information concerning the doctrines and 
practices of the Primitive Church, set up what ap- 
peared in Europe like a new religion. This illus- 
tration is equally cogent whether Christianity be true 
or false; for there can be no dispute that those who » 
possess a copy of the Bible have at their command a 
knowledge of the facts believed, the principles accepted, 
and the practices adopted by the founders of this 
religion. ) 

It would furthermore appear, frcm the principle laid 
down, that a book containing divers communications 
from God would be likely to contain much that might 
be produced without a miracle. To be comprehensible, 
such Divine oracles would require to be accompanied 
by some account of the circumstances attending their 
delivery ; and if we can learn a little about the men 
who received them, and the part they played in history, 
the value of their message will be enhanced. It must 
also be unspeakably valuable to know how the Divine 
messages were treated by men generally ; how it fared 
with those who believed, and with those who denied or 
rejected them. The thoughts of good men concerning 
these oracles, and the accumulated witness of succes- 
Sive generations to their wisdom, goodness and truth, 
as tested by experience, would all be precious. The 
varied forms into which the original truths might be 
cast for practical purposes at different epochs; the 
laws formed upon them, the devotional literature to 
which they gave rise; the controversies they provoked; 
and the manner in which commandments were en- 
forced, promises fulfilled, obedience justified, and faith 
rewarded—all these and many more subsidiary matters 


188 The Mystery of God. 


which no miracle would be needed to supply, might 
worthily be incorporated in a divinely-provided book. 
These human portions of it would all be revelations, 
though not strictly speaking Divine revelations. Their 
subject-matter and their authorship would alike be 
earthly, although closely related to the Divine, and if 
God inspired men to serve His purposes by their com- 
position—if, furthermore, He so appointed their order, 
and so overruled their collection, as to furnish mankind 
with a book which He deemed adequate for the preser- 
vation and diffusion of His oracles, as a series of pro- 
gressive revelations, and sufficient for all purposes 
of religious instruction—then, notwithstanding many 
human elements, it would be a God-given book, and 
might more truly be called Divine than human. Thus, 
although, as Mr. F. W. Newman discovered, history is 
not religion, yet religion may have a history; and that 
history may become invaluable as at once the illustra- 
tion, the commendation, and the verification of oracles 
presented to us as having been spoken of old time unto 
the fathers. 


Section II.—The Method and Spirit of Inquiry concerning 
the Buble. 


Our business must now be to inquire whether we 
have reasonable grounds for believing that the Bible is 
thus a God-provided book. In prosecuting this inquiry 
I propose to take up the volume without assuming 
the correctness of any theory concerning it. Many 
Christians object to this method as wanting in due 
respect for what they unfalteringly affirm to be the 
Word of God. They demand that the Bible shall be 


Lhe Oracles of God. 189 


treated in an exceptional manner, not only by those 
who are already convinced of its supernatural origin, 
but also by those who are in the stage of inquiry. It 
is, however, as unreasonable for a Christian to ask Ris 
doubter to instantly assume that the Bible is Divine, 
as for a sceptic to require him to assume that it is not. 
Until a conclusion has been arrived at on adequate 
grounds, the only wise course is to examine the Bible 
with all attainable impartiality. If, as Christians be- 
lieve, there is a more than human wisdom in its lore, 
the result of investigations thus conducted with an open 
mind, or, as Paul might say, with an ‘ unveiled face, 
must be to make its unique glory more apparent. 

But while we thus approach the Scriptures as in- 
quirers, I may be pardoned for insisting that even the 
most sceptical should do so in a spirit of reverence. 
On merely literary grounds they are entitled to our pro- 
foundest respect, because, as many irreligious men of 
genius have confessed, they stand alone in the world for 
originality and wealth of thought, for sublimity of dic- 
tion, and for splendour of imagination. None but cold or 
careless minds can regard without veneration a volume 
which has such a history as the Bible, even apart from 
the history it contains. It is a spring at which nations 
have been drinking for thousands of years. When we 
read its pages, our eyes are fastened on words which 
have thrilled the souls of millions, causing them often 
to tremble while they hearkened to the reasonings of 
Apostles and Prophets concerning righteousness, tem- 
perance, and judgment to come; kindling repentance, 
inspiring hopes, enthralling the reflective in hours of 
meditation ; impelling peoples and individuals to heroic 


190 The Mystery of God. 


struggles and sublime sacrifices, comforting their hearts 
in sorrow, and shedding light upon ‘ the way to ‘dusty 
death.’ As we ponder its thoughts, we learn the forces 
by which many of the noblest lives have been inspired, 
and the most triumphant departures out of life have 
been sustained. To treat this book as a common thing 
were to prove ourselves insensible to what is sanctified 
by the purest and loftiest memories of our race, even 
for those who hold it sacred in no higher sense. As 
we uncover our heads at the portal of an ancient 
temple, where myriads have bowed down, and where 
the ashes of many sages and mighty men lie buried— 
and as we do this without pausing to ask whether their 
creed and our own agree—so, to take the very lowest 
ground, it must become us to open with reverence a 
volume which enshrines the most precious remains, the 
spiritual relics, of many of the truest princes and chiefs 
of mankind, and is hallowed by ancient association 
with the worship of a multitude which no man can 
number. 


Section III —Some E lementary Facts respecting the Buble. 


Approaching the Bible in this spirit, what do we 
find? A brief inspection ascertains that, although 
bound as one volume, it is a collection of books written 
by different authors at remote periods, and that it 
comprises the most varied kinds of composition. Here 
are histories, laws, dramas, lyrics, proverbs, biogra- 
phies, political manifestoes, moral discussions, public 
and private letters, and visions of things to come, in 
heaven and on earth. 

The volume is divided into two main sections, called 


Lhe Oracles of God. IQI 


Old and New Testaments: the more ancient portion 
having been composed for the most part in Hebrew, 
and the newer part in Greek. Each book is cut 
up into chapters and verses, but these are only a 
modern device for convenient reference. The chapters 
are also provided with brief headings of contents, 
but of these all are modern, many imaginative, and 
some grotesque. Some of the books have no author’s 
name attached; to others names have been prefixed 
on probable or traditional grounds. In the margins 
we find figures, some giving the supposed dates of 
the events narrated in the text, and others the dates 
of authorship. But these again are modern, and 
form no part of the original documents. Pursuing our 
inquiries about these dates, we find great differences of 
opinion among good authorities, but that within 
certain limits no controversy can be raised. The latest 
book of the New Testament, viz.: the Gospel accord- 
ing to John, was, by universal consent, in existence in 
the middle of the second century. The greater part 
of the New Testament was in existence before the 
destruction of Jerusalem in a.p. 70. 

Regarding the Old Testament, we learn that its 
contents had all been translated into Greek, and were 
read in public throughout the Roman Empire, at least 
a hundred and fifty years before Christ, the great 
subject of the New Testament, was born. The oldest 
traditions ascribe some of these writings in their 
present form to Moses, who lived’ about ps.c. 1500. 
Some modern critics assign them to a much later date, 
but it is agreed that they contain documents which 
must have been in existence before the time of Moses. 


192 The Mystery of God. 


Without dispute, there are Psalms dating from over 
1000 years B.c., and prophetic books ranging from 
about 800 to 400 years B.c. We may therefore leave 
an immense margin for debated questions, and say, 
without risk of challenge, that the composition of the 
Bible spreads over a period of more than a thousand 
years; a period as great as that which divides us to-day 
from the kingship of Alfred the Great. 


Section IV.—The Unity of the Bible. 


Let us now inquire: Is there any real unity in these 
books? They are bound together as one work, and in 
this form have been translated into more than two 
hundred and fifty languages. Is this a mere freak of 
fortune, or is it due to the perception of a vital con- 
nection between the many parts? 

In the first place, they have all been produced by 
Hebrews, 7.e. by men of one race. This alone would 
not justify or account for their combination, but if they 
are united in other respects, it becomes a most marvel- 
lous phenomenon, for no ingenuity could compile a 
book, with any semblance of unity, out of any other 
national literature, taking the compositions of thirty or 
forty authors who wrote very nearly at the same time; 
much less if they wrote at distant intervals through a 
period of a thousand years. 

Furthermore, the binding together of these many 
writings has not been effected by national pride, or 
even by men of the Hebrew nationality. One small 
section of the race, tinged with Gentile blood, broke 
away from the main stock several centuries before 
Christ, and only accepted the frst five books. The 


Lhe Oracles of God. | 193 


Jews, as a People, have never received the New 
Testament, which they view with detestation, Its 
contents were really brought together, and added to 
the Old Testament, by foreigners ; the canon being 
discussed and settled by councils in which Many nations 


years, and against the Protest of the nation which 
produced it. Clearly this also is a fact unique in the 
literary history of the world. 

What, then, are the chief elements of unity which men 
have found by study, or felt instinctively to be present, 
binding this library into one organic whole ? 

These books are all one in their views of God. There 
is progress in the clearness and fulness with which His 
many attributes are displayed and His various relations 
expounded, but the earliest ideas of God contain in 
outline and suggest by implication al] that follow. 

From first to last He js the same Self-existent, perfect 
Being, who pities His creatures as a father pitieth his 
children; who chastens them, yet is slow to anger, 
teady to forgive, pleased to hear their prayers, wishful 
to encourage hopes of good things to come. There 
are separate passages and incidents which Many think 


assume, and so do not affect its unity Phe God wis 
sent fire to Sodom is the God whose terrible judgments 
on nations and cities are announced by Christ, and 
portrayed in the awfy] Symbols of the Apocalypse. 


13 


194 The Mystery of God. 


The God who suffered Israel to conquer Canaan when 
the land had become intolerably wicked is the God 
who threatened to send His Roman servants to destroy 
Jerusalem, and cast the Jews forth from their ancient 
heritage. This is a fair specimen of the way in which 
the alleged defects of His ways discovered in the Old 
Testament are recited and repeated in the New. 
Goodness and severity, righteous mercy and merciful 
chastisements, are marks of the Divine character, as 
represented consistently in the Bible from age to age. 

But not only do the Hebrew writers of the Bible 
agree amongst themselves while opposing all the world 
in their idea of God, but they are one in their mode 
of putting Him before us. They never indulge in 
philosophic discussions about His Being. Where men 
like Socrates labour to prove and toil to confirm by 
abstract doctrines of probability, they proclaim. They 
speak as men having authority, and not as the scribes 
of their own and the sages of other lands. The first 
verse in the Bible does not even affirm the Divine 
existence, but simply says, ‘In the beginning God 
created the heaven and the earth,’ and this quiet way 
of telling a known fact pervades the books throughout. 

These writers see and regret Atheism and all kinds 
and degrees of scepticism, but they speak with strong 
assurance as the intimates of God. They tell forth 
His alleged mandates and promises, and deliver His 
oracles with the accent of men who have come 
straight from the King’s presence. They all speak 
with dignity as from above, and talk of the heavenly 
realm with as much calm assurance as if it were their 
native land. 


The Oracles of God. 195 


Another mark of unity and of singularity in the Bible 
is the view of human nature which pervades it. All 
through its pages man is represented as a sinner. He 
is not only charged with doing wrong to his fellows, 
but every wrong deed is regarded as a personal offence | 
against God. From first to last the Bible is true to 
this doctrine. Some of its alleged moral defects are 
simply marks of inexorable fidelity to this first principle. 
It paints many portraits of good and great men, and 
holds them up as in some respects model characters ; 
but apart from its statements about Christ, it never 
makes an exception to the verdict, ‘There is none 
righteous ; no, not one.’ The choicest characters, such 
as Abraham, Moses, David, Elijah, Peter, John and 
Paul, are all depicted as men of like passions with dur- 
selves, and their gravest faults are written down, 
without abatement or excuse, just as if the writers 
were recording angels. 

On the other hand, bad men are never depicted as 
monstrosities. Their worst crimes are treated as 
extreme symptoms of the great epidemic; but the 
wicked are no more vituperated as inhuman than the 
best men are worshipped as ideal heroes or spotless 
saints. None are so good as to need no repentance ; 
but none are too bad to be forgiven if they repent. 
The discussions of Paul on the inner strife of man dis- 
close a philosophy of human nature which, although 


“never previously expounded, is never violated by the 


author of any one of the many histories, biographies, 
laws, proverbs, prayers, hymns, and predictions which 
are spread over the literature of previous centuries. 
Another sign of unity in the Bible is the reamrkable 
13—2 


196 The Mystery of God. 


manner in which the later writers deal with the earlier. 
No author seems to have apprehended that he was 
composing an integral part of a great volume; and yet 
something fresh is continually being added which 
comes between the older and newer parts, not as one 
lifeless stone is laid upon another stone in a building, 
but as the new wood made by a living tree comes 
between its earlier and later growths. Primitive pro- 
mises reappear in often varied forms, but unchanged in 
substance. Laws become the burthen of confessional 
psalms, and promises the inspiration of praise through 
successive generations. The lives of elder worthies 
adorn and vivify the words of counsel spoken to their 
posterity. Historic judgments are used again and 
again as warnings against familiar crimes. Prophet 
quotes prophet and carries on the vision. Christ 
quotes Moses and the prophets as witnesses to Him- 
self. Apostles quote the Old Testament at large, and 
with freedom; bring out unnoticed meanings in antique 
words and rites, and show in clearest fashion the per- 
sistent purpose and changeless continuity of God’s 
method. 

This opens out another (mark of unity, on which 
volumes might be written: viz., the development 
traceable throughout the Bible and its teachings. The 
unity of doctrine is not that of a monotonous and un- 
progressive sameness, but like the personal identity of 
one who passes through childhood, youth, and matu- 
rity. The Name of God, as proclaimed to Moses, 
could not possibly have been communicated to Adam 
in his primitive childish innocence ; for the words in 
which it is couched ere such as derive their meaning 


The Oracles of God. 197 


from centuries of moral discipline ; and yet that Name 
which describes His nature as ‘ full of compassion and 
gracious, slow to anger, plenteous in mercy and truth, 

keeping mercy for thousands, forgiving iniquity and | 
transgressions and sin, and that will by no means 
clear the guilty,’ is a Name which implies all those 
views of man’s lapsed condition which are exhibited in 
the records of primeval life. The Sermon on the 
Mount could not have been spoken on Sinai; or if 
uttered would in great part have been meaningless. 
Yet it is equally true that that discourse could not have 
been uttered unless the law of Sinai had preceded it 
and been long in use. . Every careful reader may see 
that Jesus was speaking to the slowly gathered experl- 
ence of ages; and that, while clearing away many vain 
traditions which, like moss overgrowing an ancient 
inscription, had concealed the writings of Moses, 
He was also bringing out a deeper meaning than the 
great lawgiver had seen in his own precepts. The 
spiritual doctrines of the New Testament are largely 
conveyed in terms which were slowly created by ritual 
worship in the temple and by the events of Hebrew 
history. Some of the most beautiful and instructive 
sayings of Christ are the transference to Himself of 
Old Testament imagery; ¢.g., where He likens Him- 
self to bread from heaven, His doctrine to running 
water, His leadership to the light of the cloudy pillar, 
His body to the temple, and His death to the uplifting 
of the brazen serpent. The whole story of the Exodus 
becomes a storehouse of metaphor and trope to depict 
the soul’s escape from bondage: its committal to 
Christ as guide, captain, and provider; its manifold 


198 The Mystery of God. 


temptations ; its protracted journey through a land of 
sense which affords no spiritual food ; and its final entry 
into the fatherland beyond the flood. These are only 
a few typical specimens of the manner in which the 
spiritual is developed out of the natural, and of the way 
in which tales of tedious trial and discipline open like 
flowers of unguessed beauty when the light of fuller 
knowledge streams upon them in later books. 

Out of many other marks of unity noted for use, only 
one can now be stated, viz., that the books of the 
Bible taken altogether present a coherent conception 
of the past and prospective history of the human race 
under the Divine government. The point here re- 
marked upon is not the sublimity of the scheme, nor 
its ‘adequacy to solve the mystery of evil; but the 
marvellous unity of the Bible, as a progressive unfold- 
ing of this magnificent ideal by different writers, 
scattered over many centuries. It opens with a book 
of origins, it closes with a book of destiny. The inter- 
mediate pages show the human race toiling and fight- 
ing through sins and doubts and fears, and until the 
latest books are added, the enigma of life remains 
unsolved. The Old Testament without the New, is like 
an) undinished™ ‘drama, sor Ja half-toldi tale. ; ltias,.as 
clearly imperfect and in need of supplement as the 
Pilgrim’s Progress would have been if Bunyan had 
only conducted Christian to the Valley of Humiliation, 
while describing him as bound for the Celestial City. 
The Jews themselves confess their sacred volume 
incomplete, and have waited nearly two thousand years 
for a sequel less offensive to their tribal vanity than the 
New Testament presents; but other peoples see that: 


The Oracles of God. 199 


the very features of the New Testament which render 
it most obnoxious to Jewish pride are its highest title 
to acceptance with mankind. Christ, as depicted in 
its pages, burst the ripe husk of Judaism; the chosen 
nation died that it might no more abide alone, but | 
rise up a nation of one mind and spirit, wherein earthly 
divisions of country, tribe, and language shall be as 
nought, and so become a universal kingdom, into 
which all the kingdoms of this world niay be gradually 
absorbed under the spiritual monarchy of the Prince 
of Peace. The Jews are opposed to this ideal, but the 
world confesses, if not the truth, at least the logical 
unity and dramatic grandeur of those visions of Patmos, 
which gather up the symbols of the Old Testament 
and link the sorrow of Eden, the midnight dream of 
Abraham, and the dynastic hopes of David, with 
the eternal joy of redeemed humanity before the 
throne of Him who keepeth covenant and mercy for 
ever. 

These marks of unity in a volume composed by so 
many authors, living so far apart in time and under 
such dissimilar conditions of political, literary and 
social life, are very difficult phenomena to account for ; 
and certainly never have been accounted for as yet, on 
the supposition that no Higher Mind presided over the 
work. Taken by themselves, they afford a body of 
evidence which grows upon the mind in value the more 
carefully it is considered, but their chief importance 
can only be seen in conjunction with some other facts 
which have yet to be established by the application to 
the Scriptures of some further tests. 


200 Lhe Mystery of God. 


Section V.—The alleged Verbal Infallibility of the Bible. 


At this point two main courses are before us. We 
may take the claims put forward by many Christian 
advocates, and test the Bible by the standard of Divine 
infallibility, or we may take the estimate of many 
opponents, and try it by the standard of possible 
human excellence. In the one case we ask, Is it all 
Divine? and then the discovery of a few discrepancies 
of statement, or other signs of human infirmity, will be 
fatal to its character. In the other case we ask, Is it 
all human? and then the discovery of even a few 
marks of superhuman knowledge and wisdom will 
establish the fact that it contains at least some Oracles 
of God. This second test involves also a subsidiary 
question as to the general credibility of the Scriptures, 
in so far as they treat of earthly things and are within 
the province of human knowledge, and thus are capable 
of comparison with other sources of information. — 

If we were compelled to confine ourselves to the 
former of these tests, the case would soon be closed. 
It is obvious that, whatever may be claimed on its 
behalf, the Bible does not represent that all its own 
contents are of the same value and authority, or that 
every sentence is an oracle from God. It is only in 
theory that this is ever misunderstood. The writers 
often confess their own doubts and fears, and some- 
times their reluctance to be employed. They lay bare 
their frequent faults and errors, and tell how these 
were Divinely corrected. When the writers of the 
New Testament quote from the Old Testament, they 
seldom do so with literal exactness. Sometimes they 


The Oracles of God. 201 


cite the Hebrew, giving their own translation, sometimes 
they use the Septuagint version, but often they give a 
free rendering of the substance, and occasionally weld 
together sentences or clauses from different authors. — 
Studying a book like Job, it is at once manifest that 
the author never wished us to read it all as God’s word. 
It is full of contradictory views of Job’s character, of 
the causes of his calamities, and of the Divine method 
of dealing with men. Vehement arguments and invec- 
tives are launched against one another by five different 
men, and the whole discussion is concluded by a 
general rebuke administered to the speakers by the 
Almighty for their unwise talk. At the close we see 
these five men offering sacrifices to God for the sins 
they had committed in their speech; clearly, therefore, 
to quote as Divine oracles the utterances for which they 
were reproved, and of which they thus repented, is to 
do the most flagrant violence to the book. It is to 
take for ‘bread’ what the author has plainly labelled 
‘stone,’ and for an ‘egg’ what he has exhibited as a 
‘scorpion,’ whereby Job was almost mortally stung. 
The most cursory examination of various other books 
will compel any untrammelled reader to recognise the 
marks of human imperfection. Different accounts are 
given of the words written at Sinai on the stone tables 
of the law. Parallel histories in the Books of Kings 
and Chronicles contain discrepancies of detail which no 
ingenuity can reconcile. The four gospels combined 
present a more lifelike and impressive image of Christ 
than any one apart, but they transpose the order of 
some events, connect the same words with different in- 
cidents, and even in relating the institution of the 


202 Lhe Mystery of God. 


Lord’s Supper give the words of Christ in slightly 
varied forms. The student can find what Christ did 
on this occasion, and what He meant by the service, 
but sticklers for formulas cannot ascertain the exact 
words that were employed. ; 

Apart from these manifest departures from verbal 
exactitude it is notorious that neither the Old Testa- 
ment nor the New is now possessed by the Christian 
Church in precisely the original text. Thousands of 
variations have been tabulated in the ancient manu- 
scripts. Nothing but a miracle of creation could now 
furnish an infallible version, unless, indeed, the original 
documents are somewhere treasured up for future use, 
as the Jews say that their ark lies hidden in the un- 
known grave of Moses. Most emphatically, then, it 
must be allowed that the claims advanced by some of 
the most impassioned champions of the Bible cannot 
be substantiated. Tried by the standard of verbal 
infallibility, the Scriptures are found wanting, by all 
who venture to use the same private judgment in 
this case as is recommended to Roman Catholics with 
respect to the claims of the Pope and to the doctrines 
of the Church over which he presides. 

It cannot, however, be conceded that the failure of 
the Bible to bear this test proves that it does not con- 
tain oracles from God, or is at all damaging to its credit. 
The detection of human errors and contradictions in 
the official utterances of the Roman Pontiff is conclu- 
sive of the papal controversy, because his infallibility 
has been authoritatively asserted by a General Council, 
presided over by himself. The case of the Bible is 
different. It nowhere claims to be infallible, and 


Lhe Oracles of God. 203 


neither friend nor foe has ever shown that such an 
attribute is an essential mark of a book of Divine in- 
struction, or even that it is a thinkable or possible 
thing. Many considerations tend, on the contrary, to 
show that such ideal faultlessness is antecedently im- » 
probable, and indeed almost inconceivable. To secure 
such a supernatural result in a work composed through 
human agency, and in a form presentable to fallible 
and ill-instructed senses, would involve far more 
miracles than the boldest advocates of infallibility have 
ever claimed, and far more than we can imagine a wise 
God caring to perform. To produce such a volume it 
would be necessary in the first instance for God to 
create earthly languages whose signs should perfectly 
represent heavenly ideas, and then, not only to dictate 
every syllable to the first writers, but to mechanically 
control them in, the execution of their task, and in the 
same way to govern every copyist, every translator, and 
every expounder. Ifthe actual acceptance of the exact 
letter were indispensable, He would still further need 
to guard miraculously each separate man, woman, and 
child of all the millions to whom the Bible comes, 
against mistakes of hearing, reading, quoting, recollect- 
ing and understanding. An infallible text, indeed, would 
fail of its supposed design unless complemented with 
infallible eyes, infallible tongues, infallible ears, and 
infallible intellects among the children of men. Surely 
no ‘rational sceptic’ will insist that the absence of such 
a series of useless and unnatural prodigies precludes 
the hope that God has made some communication of 
thoughts and purposes to his inquiring creatures | 

But the strongest objection on this point proceeds not 


204 Lhe Mystery of God. 


from sceptics, but from Christians; and their difficulties, 
which are rather practical than theoretical, must not 
be left unnoticed. These difficulties arise from an un- 
alterable conviction that the fine gold of truth is stored 
up for men in the Scriptures, coupled with a failure to 
see how Divine truth can be commingled with the least 
alloy of human error, if it is to be serviceable to man- 
kind. Myriads of Christian men and women have in 
their own experience an evidence which nothing can 
shake that the great doctrines of the Bible are true. 
They testify that their faith has been verified by actual 
experiments. They have acted on the belief that there 
is a correspondence between themselves and an unseen 
friend, and have not been disappointed. They are 
more certain of this experimental evidence than of any 
speculative opinions, and in such well-founded confi- 
dence every believer in Christ would encourage them to 
continue. Nothing written in these pages, rightly un- 
derstood, can tend to weaken that faith: on the con- 
trary, the separation of faith, in Him of whom the 
Bible bears witness, from an indefensible opinion about 
the Bible, can scarcely fail to afford a sense of liberty 
and strength not previously enjoyed. 

The practical difficulty which disposes so many good 
men to insist on the verbal infallibility of the Bible finds 
expression in such questions as these: How can we 
draw the line between the words of God which are in the 
Bible, and the words of men which are mixed up with 
them ?—If human defects and errors are once admitted, 
who can tell whither that admission will lead ?>—How 
can readers take up the Book for guidance and instruc- 
tion with any confidence, unless it be all alike Divine ? 


' Lhe Oracles of God. 205 


It is much to be regretted that such objections as these 
have been pressed by many prominent and honoured 
teachers of Christianity. Their effect is in many re- 
spects lamentable. They offer an unintentional provo- 
cation to a scarcely candid treatment of the ‘ Word of 
God.’ They are intended to protect the teachings of 
Scripture from destructive criticism ; but they no more 
do this than a box of cedar will preserve gold from the 
action of fire. On the one hand, opponents see the 
manifest weakness of such appeals to fear, and attribute 
to the thing defended the same weakness as they detect 
in the materials of defence ; on the other hand, those 
who have been taught that they must believe in the 
verbal infallibility of the Bible or else reject it utterly, 
are driven into a terrible dilemma when the facts 
already admitted in these. pages are forced upon their 
notice. Unless their accepted teachers are wrong, 
they must either renounce what appears the most 
precious thing on earth, or close their eyes to sundry 
features of it which can no more be denied than the 
spots in the sun. A little patient boldness, however, 
may suffice to neutralize this mischief, and to show 
that the admission of human imperfections in the 
Scriptures no more unfits them to be the joy and guide 
of life than spots in the sun impair its claim to be the 
light of the world we inhabit. 

As a matter of fact, whatever theories Christian 
people hold, they do distinguish between Divine and 
human words when reading the Bible. A simple Scot- 
tish woman, who has been taught from infancy that it 
is equally and alike Divine from Genesis to Revelation, 
and who believes that doctrine so firmly that she would 


206 The Mystery of God. 


rather die than learn to doubt it, still finds that some 
parts have a diviner power than others. In reading 
Paul’s epistles, she notices with intelligent respect that 
in some places he speaks expressly as ‘ by the Lord,’ 
and at others, ‘as a man;’ and she finds no difficulty 
in valuing the former passages more highly than the 
latter. When reading the gospels she has no diffi- 
culty in distinguishing between the words of Jesus 
Christ and those of the Tempter in the wilderness, or 
those of the Scribes and Pharisees, of Herod and 
Pilate, and the common people. It never occurs to her, 
-when reading those gospels, to treat any but Christ’s 
words as if they were Divine oracles. If by a consistent 
but preposterous application of her theory she were 
blinded to these glaring differences, she would some- 
times be guided by Christ, sometimes by the opponents 
He refutes, and sometimes by the disciples whose 
crudities He corrects. 

What is done instinctively and almost unconsciously, 
in such obvious cases as these, needs to be done all 
through the Bible; and clear-eyed souls will seldom 
find the process very hard. The professed oracles of 
God are generally unmistakable. For the most part 
they are introduced in ways no child need fail to under- 
stand. ‘The word of the Lord came to me’—‘ Thus 
saith the Lord’—‘ And God said’—these and similar 
phrases abound. Sometimes the writer describes the 
manner in which the message came—as by dream, or 
vision, or angelic messengers. The Bible thus bears 
upon its face the evidence that it is not only a record 
of oracles received from God, but also an account of 
the manner in which men received them, and of how 


The Oracles of God. 207 


the world treated these men and their messages. It is 
avowedly the history not only of Divine commands and 
promises, but of human faith and obedience in conflict 
with human unbelief and disobedience. It preserves 
not only the words of God’s servants, but those of His. 
worst adversaries. It reports the delusive sophistries 
and lies of Satan, the sneers of scoffers, the falsehoods 
of impostors, the delusions of the superstitious, and the 
doubts and inconsistencies of saints. It treasures up 
for our study not only the thoughts which are declared 
to have been in God’s mind about man, but the 
thoughts which have seethed in human breasts con- 
cerning God, and life and death, and things seen and 
unseen. It sets before us the denials of Atheism and 
the blasphemies of the wicked together with the con- 
fessions, entreaties, and thanksgivings of the holy. It 
is this variety of contents which gives it universal 
adaptation to man’s needs. Men of all characters, 
temperaments, and grades of culture find their natures 
mirrored in these pages, and are presented with some 
oracle given of old to meet whatever stage of experience 
they have reached. It is not merely, therefore, that 
the Bible is not lessened in value as a book of Divine 
counsel by a frank recognition of these many human 
elements, but its full use and value only becomes evident 
when these are carefully observed. Any theory which 
fails to account for them must necessarily tend to per- 
plex its readers. To derive instruction, correction, 
and guidance from the Bible, we need to have our eyes 
open and our hearts alert, in order to judge concerning 
any sentence whether it be of man or God. 

_ Those who have never read the Bible with a clear 


208 | The Mystery of God. 


recognition of this duty will find by experiment that it 
becomes a book of new glory and worth. How often 
do Christians feel perplexed and morally shaken in 
reading portions of the Bible because they find actions 
related and sentiments expressed which, found in any 
other book, they would condemn! In the Psalms they 
come continually upon passages which strike them pain- 
fully as revengeful and cruel. It is all supposed to be 
God’s word, however, and so the moral judgment is 
suspended, and thereby enfeebled and _ confused. 
Perhaps a notion is adopted that what was morally 
right under the old dispensation has become wrong 
under the new; but by such a view God’s changeless 
character is impugned to save the honour of his word. 
But if the Psalms are read as in part God’s word to 
man, and in part man’s words uttered to God, or 
poured out as meditations in His presence, the con- 
science is cleared for action, and finds a wondrous 
field for moral and spiritual exercise. It cannot indeed 
be pretended that the study of the Bible presents no 
difficulties when the presence of human elements has 
been confessed, but only that its most serious difficulties 
are removed. It is full of difficulties. It is a book 
which millions have studied for many years, and for 
its exposition libraries have been written in many lan- 
guages ; yet still the greatest students feel themselves but 
novices. But in all this the Bible is the counterpart of 
Nature, which the proud, the indolent, and the rash 
can never understand, and which even the most child- 
like, indefatigable, and careful students can only learn 
by degrees, and by often reconsidering the conclusions 
which once seemed final. But unless the words of 


Lhe Oracles of God. 209 


Christ are false, there is 4 Guide and Teacher who 
will aid the humble and sincere seeker after Truth. 
Christ declared that if any man wills to do the will of 
the Father, he shall know at least one thing concerning | 
any doctrine, viz., whether it be of man, or whether it 
be of God. Should any ask how they can draw a line 
between the thoughts of God and the thoughts of man 
in independence of that condition, there is no answer 
except this: They are asking for what the Scriptures 
nowhere promise, and for a Power which, if possessed, 
would take away the mora] discipline which their study 
now affords. | 


Section VI.—The General Credibility of the Bible. 


We pass now from the test of absolute infallibility 
to try the Scriptures by a lower but more practical 
Standard. Logically, we might proceed at once to 
Inquire: Does the Bible contain any superhuman 
elements? without staying to discuss its general ex- 
cellence and credibility. Gold does not cease to be 
gold, however inferior the substance in which it is 
embedded; and so an oracle may be Divine, though 
uttered by prophets or ‘priests which have infirmity,’ 
and preserved in a volume made of earthly materials. 
The man in Christ's parable, who parted with all his 
possession to buy a field in which he had found a 
buried treasure, did not stop to ask about the quality 
of the soil. If a friend had turned up a spadeful of 
poor earth and said ‘ This field is not worth buying,’ 
the man would still have persisted in his design. So, 
if we can find a Divine message in the Bible, it must be 
our wisdom to hold it as the most precious thing in 


14 


210 The Mystery of God. 


the world, whatever surrounding imperfections may be 
thrown up by critics before our eyes. 

But while this is true theoretically, most men have 
an irresistible feeling that God would not deposit His 
truth in a book which abounded in fiction. False 
statements about earthly things would destroy the 
credit of writers who profess to convey heavenly com- 
munications. Legends presented as sober history 
would diminish confidence in all moral teachings that 
might be founded upon them, and we should be in- 
vincibly suspicious of the most strikingly fulfilled 
predictions if they were associated with manifest dis- 
honesty in the narration of past or contemporaneous 
events. Errors are human, and cleave to the highest 
and purest human works. But we justly: distinguish 
between these inevitable traits of man’s infirmity and 
that untruthfulness or gross ignorance which disqualifies 
for the task of writing history. 

The general credibility of the Scriptures thus be- 
comes of great importance. We want to know that 
the writers were honest and well-informed—men who, 
in regard to the earthly side of their work, may be 
trusted as we should desire to be trusted ourselves. 
More than this would be superfluous, less than this 
would be fatal to their usefulness. Let a man imagine 
himself the recipient of a Divine oracle suited to the 
England of to-day. Let him further imagine himself 
sitting down to write this message in conjunction with 
so much narration of English history, and so much 
allusion to natural phenomena, public men, and foreign 
affairs as would be requisite for the effective deliver- 
ance of his message. Let him conceive the degree of 


The Oracles of God. 21F 


accuracy he would be likely to attain in his own part 
of the work, if divinely inspired to undertake the task 
and to put the ‘substance of the oracle as God desired. 
Let him further consider how he would wish to be 
treated by his fellow-men afterwards; how grieved and 
indignant he would feel if his message were refused 
because of some scarcely scientific expressions, or some 
minor mistakes about names or dates, or the precise 
order of subordinate events. Let him also consider 
how complacently he would endure the closest literary 
criticism, if only his fidelity and general competence 
were approved, and his Divine message reverently 
entertained. Having gone through this exercise of 
imagination, he will know fairly well how to measure 
and appreciate the general credibility of the Scriptures. 

The Bible has been assailed in recent tintes on the 
score of its alleged opposition to some conclusions of 
physical science. So far as this attack is directed 
against miracles as assumed to be incompatible with 
the reign of natural law, it has been dealt with in the 
preceding chapter. All that will be attempted here is 
to estimate the importance of any unscientific expres- 
sions or views which may actually exist. 

Few expositors now assert that the authors of 
Scripture exhibit a perfect knowledge of Nature. 
Among ancient writers they stand alone in their in- 
tense appreciation of the beauty and wisdom displayed 
in what they contemplate as the works of God’s hands. 
The knowledge evinced by them is surprisingly minute 
and varied, and in many respects has been strikingly 
verified by the results of modern research. In some 
cases their knowledge is utterly inexplicable; ¢.g., the 

I4—2 


212 The Mystery of God. 


acquaintance with vast astronomical cycles implied in. 
certain prophetic announcements. It is obvious, also, 
that the study of Nature was regarded by the Hebrews 
as the mark of a religious spirit, and is directly en- 
couraged by many fervent admonitions. The descrip- | 
tions of natural objects which abound in the Bible 
have never been surpassed or even equalled, and the 
sublime imagery drawn from natural scenes and events 
with which the Bible teems has made ita storehouse. 
from which orators and poets have filled their minds 
and enriched their noblest productions. If required 
by our present argument, enough might be written 
on these and kindred points to show that we are 
largely indebted to the Bible for the modern spirit of 
inquiry and of patient observation. But when all 
this had been said and admitted, we should still be 
confronted ‘with a variety of real or alleged inac- 
curacies: ¢.g., it is now generally allowed that the 
account of the creation in Genesis i. contains some 
views which are not in strict accordance with the 
teachings of modern science. The points of difference 
now asserted are not so serious as those which have 
been disposed of, but they are not to be ignored. 
Only a few belated guardians of ill-chosen and generally 
abandoned positions persist in affirming that the days 
spoken of are periods of twenty-four hours. The 
opinion of some ancient interpreters is now commonly 
received on both sides of the controversy ; viz., that 
the events allotted to some of the ‘days’ include pro- 
longed processes of change—as, ¢.g., the growth, seed- 
bearing, and propagation of plants—and that therefore 
the word ‘day’ must, as in many other places, be, 


Ihe Oracles of God. 215 


understood to denote an age. Whether the order of 
natural progress from the primitive chaos to the exist- 
ing cosmos precisely corresponded to the order of this 
ancient description is still an open question. Scientific 
knowledge is not yet complete, and what is called 
science to-day may be as greatly modified by future 
discoveries as the opinions of thirty years ago have 
been by later researches and discussions. Biblical in- 
terpretation, also, is not finally determined. Know- 
ledge of Nature has hitherto been the: best expositor 
of Genesis, and has opened our eyes to see wonders 
which formerly were concealed ; and until this expositor 
has finished his work, we may be content to await the 
results. While experts in two distinct, though now re- 
lated, branches of study are debating the harmony of 
their respective conclusions, some of which upon both 
sides are variable and tentative, it ill becomes us to 
be dogmatic. The possible points of disagreement 
between the final exegesis of Nature and of Genesis 
are now fairly well known. Some of these points are 
generally thought to be established; but without in- 
dulging in any admissions or assertions, I propose to 
ask, Whether the author of Genesis would be dis- 
credited and the value of the Bible be diminished if 
these points of disagreement should be finally and in- 
disputably established ? 

The only way of arriving at an answer to this 
question is, first of all to ascertain what object he had 
before him in writing. If he laboured to teach man- 
kind physical science, the admission destroys his claim 
- to retain a place among our instructors in this age, 
however far he may have been in advance of his own, 


“214 | ‘The Mystery of God. 


If he founded a religious doctrine, or an ethical prin- 
ciple, on a supposed physical fact which turns out to 
be imaginary, his doctrine or principle is not thereby . 
proved untrue, but his authority as a teacher is for- 
feited. | 
But when we examine the account of creation, it 
speedily appears that the author of the first chapter of 
Genesis had no theory in science to establish. His 
one great aim was to teach a fundamental lesson of 
religious faith. His grand doctrine is summed up by 
the writer to the Hebrews: ‘ By faith we understand 
that the worlds have been framed by the word of God, 
so that what is seen hath not been made out of things 
which do appear’ (Hebrews xi. 3). That is a faith 
which lies at the back of all science. Physical search 
can neither prove nor disprove it. It has nothing 
whatever to do with the method or duration of the 
formative work. It asserts against Atheism that the 
universe has a Divine Maker. Against Pantheism it 
affirms that God and His works are not to be con- 
founded, nor to be distinguished merely as the whole 
from its parts. Against Polytheism it declares that 
the world has not many rulers, but One. What was 
needed as an introduction to a book of instruction in 
religion was not a miraculous description of facts which 
are written for our discovery in the rocks and stars. 
Men could well afford to wait for their knowledge of 
things made until able to acquire it for themselves 
and might wisely be left to find some of their highest 
culture and purest enjoyments in its pursuit. The one 
thing needful as a prelude to all revelation was an 
oracle to declare that it was One Eternal God who 


The Oracles of God. 215 


created the heavens, and stretched them forth ; who 
“spread abroad the earth and that which cometh out 
of it ;’ and ‘that giveth breath to the people upon it, and 
spirit to them that walk therein’ (Isaiah xlii. 5). This 
is the grand purport and burden of the sublime Psalm 
of Creation in Genesis. Ina few sentences of unrivalled 
beauty, it traces in outline the development of the earth 
from chaos to form, and thence the introduction of 
vegetable and animal life in an ascending scale, until at . 
last man appears upon the scene as the destined in- 
habitant for whom the spacious home was prepared, 
and as the appointed lord over the entire domain. 
Unless we believe this oracle, we cannot respond to 
the invitation which runs through the Bible, to ‘ worship 
and bow down,’ and ‘ kneel before the Lord our Maker.’ 
If we accept it as true, no discoveries within the realm 
of things made can shake our trust in God as the Author 
and Master of things. All Atheistic inferences drawn 
from physical knowledge, and all idolatrous tendencies 
which are linked with physical ignorance, are directly 
at variance with Genesis. But the actual knowledge 
of Nature which has been gathered in our day may all 
be read into the lines of the ancient story, and should 
deepen our admiration for its marvellous simplicity and 
comprehensive truth. 

df the Hebrew account of the creation be compared 
with the Chaldean, which inculcates idolatry, and is 
full of low morality and absurd fancies,* the religious 
value of it for the ancient world will be vividly realized. 
If it be compared with those modern works which 
_ describe the evolution of the world in materialistic 


* “The Chaldean Account of Genesis,’ by George Smith. 


216 Lhe Mystery of God. 


terms, and to the exclusion of a Great First Cause, its 
religious value for our own day will be apparent. 
Having seen how absurd and incredible is the Material- 
istic hypothesis, we may also venture to retort the 
charge of error upon its authors. The imperfections 
of Genesis in matters of physical science are small as 
the specks of dust which float in the sunbeams, but 
which cast no visible shadow. The great sun shines 
in upon us with unimpaired power and glory, in spite 
of all these flecks. But purely mechanical theories of 
how the world took form involve such monstrous 
beliefs in physical impossibilities that their errors are 
by comparison as huge as the moon in an eclipse. 
By them the first principles of physical science are 
darkened, while at the same time the Great Father 
of Lights is hidden from the world, and a cold shadow 
of Death is cast upon the souls of men. 

Space forbids the further discussion of scientific 
objections to the credibility of the Bible. If the 
views already advanced commend themselves to the 
reader, such discussions, however interesting, and for 
many purposes valuable, will not here be requisite. I 
the first oracle concerning God as the Creator be re- 
jected, the remainder of the Bible must go with it in 
one mass as a book of religious instruction furnished by 
God. If it be received as true, and its light be carried 
as a lamp for the perusal of all subsequent pages, no 
difficulty will be felt in passages which speak of Nature 
in the current phraseology of the ages in which they were 
written. Unless God meant to give a revelation of all 
the chief sciences, He must generally allow His servants 
to write in the ordinary manner of their time. It is 


Lhe Oracles of God. 3 br, 


scarcely necessary to point out how much worse than 
superfluous such a premature revelation would have 
been. To man’s intellectual discipline it would have 
been fatal, by excusing him the toils and pains of in- 
vestigation ; and yet at the same time its vastness 
and complexity would have interposed an enormous 
obstacle to the study of religious knowledge. 

The most decisive test of general credibility is that 


_ supplied by History. Unsparing efforts have been 


made in some quarters to prove the legendary charac- 
ter of the Scriptures; and outside the circle of critical 
students there is a wide-spread impression that this 
attempt has been successful. Those who have been 
taught that there are, and can be, no discrepancies in 
the Bible, are naturally staggered when a few of these, 
however unimportant, are pointed out, and are predis- 
posed to allow that the discovery is as fatal as both 
assailants and defenders of the Bible have asserted. 
The position already taken in this chapter makes room 
for the frank admission of flaws wherever they can be 
proved to exist: but experience shows that they are 
rare; and advancing knowledge, which seems at first 
to multiply their number, is steadily diminishing the 
list. To illustrate what is meant by this statement, 
and to show how much caution is needed in dealing 
with assertions which are verbally discrepant or con- 
tradictory, a fact may be mentioned in connection with 
Woolston, the celebrated Deist. It was commonly 
believed about the time of his death, and has usually 
been stated since, that Woolston died in prison ; but 


Voltaire says, ‘ Nothing can be falser; several of my 


friends saw him since his prosecution, in his own house, 


218 The Mystery of God. 


where he died at liberty.’"* It would be difficult to find 
a more direct and apparently irreconcilable conflict of 
testimony; but Dr. Cairns has discovered facts which 
show that Voltaire was correct, and yet that the Abbé 
Avocat, and others whom he charged with untruth, 
were correct also. It appears that Woolston had not 
been discharged from prison, but that he dwelt in his 
own hired house, which was within the so-called 
‘liberty’ of the Old King’s Bench in Southwark.t 
This is a fair illustration of what has taken place in 
many instances where Biblical statements have been 
impugned, and indicates the sort of reconciliation that 
a more detailed knowledge of ancient facts might pre- 
sumably establish where not yet ascertained. In 
countless instances where hasty criticism finds an 
apparent fault, further research beholds an excellency; 
and where an unsympathetic reader pounces on a 
blemish, loving insight discerns, and patient labour 
verifies, exquisite harmonies and coincidences hidden 
by verbal variations. An interesting volume has been 
written on these ‘ Undesigned Coincidences ;’ but the 
cases therein noticed, though numerous, are few in 
comparison with the multitude which might be 
gathered. Those who are not discouraged by difh- 
culties, commonly find that they provoke to the most 
fruitful study, and open paths of pleasantest research. 
This statement may not count for much as a positive 
argument, but it is the common testimony of thousands 
who spend the major part of life in such pursuits ; and 
if weighed against some opposite assertions will be 
found to turn the scale. 


* ‘Comments on Eminent Authors,’ Letter IV. 
+ ‘ Unbelief in the Eighteenth’Century,’ J. Cairns, p. 288. 


ER <-. . FRA A ae a rea oe a 


i te aa 


‘The Oracles of God. ac} 


- There are some marks of veracity which lie upon 
the face of the Old Testament history. In ordinary 
histories, written by patriots, and especially in those 
of ancient date, the tone is boastful. Whatever can 
‘minister to national pride is amplified and highly 
coloured, but humiliations are either passed over in 
‘silence or toned down. Victories and great achieve- 
ments are emblazoned, but defeats and blunders are 
discreetly covered up. We turn to the Hebrew Scrip- 
tures, and allthis is reversed. The men and women 
they depict are all frail, faulty beings, like those we 
see and know. Their battles are not all triumphs; 
their kings are not all regal, nor their soldiers all 
heroic, nor their priests all holy, nor their prophets all 


- wise and true. Of their most famous and honoured 


ancestors, the writers narrate incidents of the most 
culpable character. Abraham is held up as a pattern 
of faith and righteousness; yet the world is told how, 
through the presence of a passing fear, he condescended 
to an act of the meanest kind. The favouritism of 
Isaac, the fraud of Jacob, the idolatry of Aaron, the 
anger of Moses, and the adultery of David, are all set 
down with unshrinking fidelity. The crimes and follies 
of the people are portrayed in darkest tints; while 
ignominious passages of national life, which pride 
would have striven to bury in oblivion, are dwelt upon 
at length. These traits are the marks of photography, 
not of imaginative painting; and they attest the 
honesty and judicial severity with which Hebrew 
history was written by Hebrew authors in the Bible. 

It is impossible to account for these characteristics 
by accusing the writers of unpatriotic feelings. They 


220 The Mystery of God. 


evidently loved their country, and were ready to sacri- 
fice themselves for its honour; but were profoundly 
convinced that the best lessons were to be learned from 
the most painful experiences. Their common aim was 
manifestly to uphold God’s honour, and to show how 
nothing but righteousness and fidelity to Him can 
ultimately prosper. It was this aim which delivered 
them from spurious patriotism, and preserved them 
alike from conceited self obtrusion and from indulging 
in any flatteries of the living, or the dead, the small or 
great among their fellows. 

But we:are not obliged to rest our faith in the 
veracity of the Bible on such general grounds alone. 
Within recent years new materials for the study of 
ancient history have been obtained. Excavators have 
removed the rubbish under which the remains of some 
of the chief cities of antiquity lay buried, and so have 
brought to light libraries which supply contemporary 
records for comparison with various Scripture narra- 
tives. If the Bible had been filled with myths, what 
a day of doom would have been ushered in when the 
first spadeful of sand was thrown off the mounds of 
Mesopotamia and Egypt; and when scientific explorers 
began to measure the caves, clear out the water-courses, 
and lay bare the foundations of fallen buildings in 
Palestine! But what has been the result? Simply to 
bring out of the dust proof after proof, sign after sign, 
that those Scriptures, which professedly contain the 
oracles of God, are also faithful and true witnesses of 
bygone ages of the world. The humiliating confessions 
of the Hebrews are confirmed by many vaunting boasts 
of their enemies, and the so-called legends of their 


The Oracles of God. aon 


earlier history are established beyond cavil to be sober 
truth. 

Anything like a complete review of so vast a stretch 
of history would be impossible here. Such a task, 
however, is not needful for our purpose. The question 
of credibility can be settled for all practical purposes 
by a few specimen cases, just as the distribution of 
certain deep strata can be determined with as much 
practical certainty by a small number of borings, as if 
square miles of superficial soil were removed. It may 
safely be inferred that if the most ancient part of 
Hebrew history is of a solid and trustworthy character, 
the later portions will be the same. Myths do not 
follow after, but precede the chronicles of sober fact. 
If, therefore, the chief events which contributed to the 
making of Israel as a nation are confirmed by foreign 
records, the later history will assuredly not be less 
veracious. These foreign records may be, and un- 
questionably are, far inferior to the more literary and 
consecutive memorials of the Hebrews, but their 
authenticity and genuineness cannot be questioned, 
nor can the most suspicious mind imagine collusion 
between their authors and the scribes of Israel. 

The story of Lot’s captivity, and his rescue by 
Abraham (Gen. xiv.), has often been impugned on the 
supposition of a manifestly improper reversal of the 
relations between Babylon and Elam. The author of 
the account in Genesis represents Chedorlaomer as the 
head of the kings mentioned, whereas, according toa 
long-standing belief of historians, Amraphel, King of 


_ Shinar (Babylonia), must have held that position, if 


any such alliance had existed. It is now ascertained 


2i22 The Mystery of God. 


that there was an early, and hitherto unsuspected, con- 
quest of Babylon by Elam; that a powerful Elamite 
dynasty ruled in Babylon, and that the names of the 
kings of this line were the names of different gods 
compounded with Chedor or Kudor (supposed to mean 
servant), as in Chedorlaomer, ‘the servant of Laomer 
or Lagamer,’ a Susianian god. On one of these re- 
covered inscriptions Asshur-bani-pal, the son of Esar- 
haddon, relates that in his eighteenth year (B.c. 651), 
he restored certain images of gods, which had been 
carried to Susa 1635 years before by Kudor-Nakhunta, 
King of Elam. In this case, the monument records an 
old reverse in order to magnify a new success, and thus 
incidentally preserves a date and some facts which 
verify the historic setting of a most important incident 
in Abraham’s career.* 

Another mark of accuracy in the story of Abraham 
is obtained from the Egyptian monuments. From very 
remote times the horse has been closely identified with 
Egypt. Horses and chariots figure in the story of the 
Exodus, and. recur in many incidents and allusions; 
yet, as often pointed out, in the list of presents made to 
Abraham by Pharaoh (Gen. xii. 16), these animals are 
conspicuously absent. Does not this betray the hand 
of an inventor who was ignorant of the country? Until 
very lately criticism said ‘ Yes,’ and the abundance of 
horses which appear in pictorial representations of 
royal gifts and tributary offerings on the walls of 
Egyptian temples and tombs appeared to confirm the 
objection. But it now transpires that, up to a date 
somewhat later than can be fixed for Abraham’s visit, 


* ©Rawlinson’s Ancient Monarchies,’ Vol. I., p. 161. 


The Oracles of God. 22 


horses were not introduced into Egypt, either for 
military or domestic purposes. They were brought in 
as trophies from an Eastern expedition during the 
XVIIIth dynasty, as represented in the tomb of a war- 
rior named Pahir, at El-Kab, where there is a picture 
of a pair of horses with a chariot, the horses and their 
coachman bearing Semitic names.* 

The story of Joseph has been freely treated as a 
romantic legend quite at variance with the known 
conditions of life in Egypt. The tale of a seven years’ 
famine, and especially the statement that grain was 
stored up as a provision against scarcity in the Nile 
Valley, has been ridiculed as incredible. But Egypto- 
logists have uncovered the tomb of a man named Baba, 
who was governor of an Egyptian province in the time 
of the Shepherd Kings, when Joseph also lived, and on 
the wall of sacrifice in this tomb the following inscription 
occurs: ‘I collected the harvest, a friend of the harvest 
god. I was watchful at the time of sowing. And now 
when a famine arose, lasting many years, I issued out 
corn tothe city at each famine.’ This memorial, which 
has lain buried under sand for thousands of years, 
establishes the double fact that there was an un- 
paralleled famine in the Nile country at the time stated 
in Genesis, and that the people were kept alive by such 
an unusual collection and storage of corn as is there 
ascribed to Joseph’s counsel. The epitaph is precisely 
what one of the district rulers under Joseph would, 
according to the boastful habit of his class, have 


* See Brugsch, ‘ Egypt under the Pharaohs,’ Vol. I., p. 295. 
7 bid, Vols ia ps. 2033 


224 The Mystery of God. 


placed on his tomb if he had carried out Joseph's 
~ commands in his own particular province. 

Many other features of the narrative in Genesis and 
Exodus have received an equally remarkable verifica- 
tion. The title of Joseph’s office, ‘Adon,’ is pure 
Egyptian. The proper names mentioned are many of 
them found on the monuments of the day. Dr. Brugsch 
has shown that about Joseph’s time a kind of Semitism 
became fashionable among the ‘ golden youth’ of Egypt, 
and was satirized by grave scribes, just as a similar 
aping of foreign manners has often been ridiculed in 
our own country. 

It appears that between the time of Joseph and that 
of the Exodus the Shepherd Kings were expelled and a 
new dynasty founded. Rameses II. has been identified 
with the Pharaoh of the Bondage, and monuments 
prove that the cities he is said in Genesis to have em- 
ployed the Israelites to build were built by him at the 
time stated, and by the labour of foreign slaves, driven 
by taskmasters with whips in hand. The name of his 
daughter, ‘ Meris,’ is also found on the tombs, and 
answers to a tradition preserved by Josephus. Close 
to the battlefield of Tel-el-Kebir the agents of the 
Egyptian Exploration Fund have recently uncovered 
an ancient city bearing Pa-Tum, or Pithom, as its 
religious, and Sukut, or Succoth, as its civil name. 
This place is described in Exodus 1. II as one of the 
treasure or store cities which the Israelites built, and 
this description is verified in unmistakable ways. A 
broken statue has been found bearing the inscription: 
‘Pames-Isis, the official of Tum of Succoth, prophet of 
Hathor, and head of the storehouse.’ The construction 


The Oracles of God. 225 


of the place also exhibits its character and purpose 
beyond doubt. Except in one corner, where the ruins 
of a temple remain, the entire area is occupied by 
solidly-built store-chambers or cellars, having walls 
about ten feet thick, but with no doors or windows, 
and evidently intended to be filled and emptied from 
the top. Perhaps the most remarkable discovery of all 
is that the bricks used in their construction are found 
to be of three qualities. The best are well made with 
straw, the second in quality contain reeds (stubble), such 
as the Israelites had to gather for themselves (Ex. i. 12), 
and the worst are mere mud, as they would be when 
the supply of reeds failed.* The cry of the enslaved 
Hebrews seems thus to rise up anew out of the earth 
after more than three thousand years of silence, and 
the tale of their abject misery is told afresh in the very 
works of their hands in the land from which they were 
delivered. 

It seems vain to hope that further researches will 
find any actual record of the Exodus. Unlike the 
Hebrew historians, the Egyptians have preserved no 
memorials of their own reverses and calamities. 
Nevertheless, some indirect but unmistakable traces 
of the event have been discovered. A monument now 
in the Berlin Museum mentions the death of a son of 
Mineptah II., the Pharaoh of the Exodus, but the 
tombs of the period are silent about the king’s own 
death and the closing scenes of his reign. Other kings 
of his nation ‘sleep in glory, everyone in his own 
house,’ but he passed away under the shame of some 


* E. Naville, ‘The Store City of Pithom, and the Rou‘e of the 
Exodus,’ 


LAS. 


226 The Mystery of God. 


circumstance which pride would not narrate. Memo- 
tials of the immediately subsequent period, how- 
ever, distinctly reveal a time of confusion and national 
depression. The great works of the architect in 
building cities and temples were arrested, as would 
inevitably be the case if large numbers of foreign 
labourers were suddenly removed; no military expe- 
ditions took place for about forty years, and the 
nation which just before had been full of vital energy 
and pride was reduced to stagnation and feebleness. 
As we descend in time and the history of Israel 
touches other lands, the materials for its verification 
become enormous. An attempt to compare the dis- 
coveries of modern explorers in Moab, Palestine, 
Nineveh, Babylon, and Egypt, with the later history 
of the Old Testament, would require volumes. Works 
of this character have been prepared by writers 
specially qualified for the task, and to these the reader 
must be referred for any further pursuit of the inquiry.* 
It is submitted with confidence that the facts already 
adduced in confirmation of the earliest and most ex- 
traordinary portions of the history are abundantly 
sufficient for our present object. Myths find no sub- 
stantiation through the spade of the excavator, and he 
who reads the stories of Abraham, of Joseph, and of 
Israel in Egypt as verified history will know himself on 
firm ground when the nation enters the land in which 


* See, in addition to those already cited, ‘Egypt and Babylon,’ 
by Canon Rawlinson ; ‘Light from the Ancient Monuments,’ by 
Professor Sayce ; ‘The Memoirs of the Survey of Western Pales- 
tine,’ edited by Professor E. H. Palmer and W. Besant; and ‘ Heth 
and Moab,’ by C. R. Conder. 


The Oracles of God, 227, 


it was found by Greeks and Romans, and whence its 
children have notoriously been cast forth as exiles for 
nearly two thousand years. The main events of the 
wonderful history which follows on from the Exodus. 
are not disputed.’ The glories of David and Solomon, 
the partition of the kingdom, the wars and captivities 
of the two branches of the nation, the restoration of 
Judah, the Greek and Roman conquests, and the rise 
of the Christian religion before the destruction of Jeru- 
salem, are events as certain as the Roman and Norman 
conquests of England. 

For many reasons it would be convenient in this 
place to examine the historic credibility of the New 
Testament. It is impossible, however, to discuss that 
subject without entering at the same time into many 
deeper questions relative to Christ’s Life and Resur- 
rection. The general considerations which have been 
offered as to the credibility of Scripture apply to the 
entire Bible, but the particular evidences of the truth- 
fulness of the gospels must stand over for treatment in 
the two following chapters. 


Section VII.—The Presence of Divine Elements in the 
} Bible. 


We now proceed to apply our third test, by inquiring, 
Does the Bible contain any elements which are mani- 
festly Divine ? 

It is necessary at the outset to define the scope of 
this investigation. We are not about to ask How much 
of the Bible is Divine, but, Is any of it Divine? Prior 
to actual mining operations no surveyor can say how 
much gold there isina given region, or what proportion 

I5—2 


220 The Mystery of God. 


it bears to the common soil. These are points which 
‘can only be decided by much digging. Practical 
miners will only demand whether there is a reasonable 
prospect of finding sufficient gold to repay the cost 
of working. So with the Bible. If the views here 
advocated are correct, it is a vast mine of wealth, 
which discloses greater riches the more diligently it 
is explored. But in commending it to the study of 
others it is only needful to exhibit a few specimens of 
the fine gold it contains. Any communication granted 
by God for the guidance and help of man in his 
journey from mystery to mystery, must be so un- 
speakably precious that’even one Divine oracle would 
richly compensate the most prolonged and arduous toil. 

The things which Christians most prize as Divine are 
those which in Paul’s phrase can only be ‘ spiritually 
discerned ;’ but there are some elements which can be 
subjected to the coarser tests of criticism. One of the 
most definite of these is the knowledge of future events. 
The predictive aspect of prophecy has in recent years 
been less esteemed than the ethical, and for the general 
purposes of instruction most justly; but if it can be 
shown that the Scriptures contain distinct prognosti- 
cations of events which have really taken place, and 
that the events foretold were such as no human sagacity 
could have foreseen as certain, or conjectured as pro- 
bable, then these predictions must have an evidential 
force irrespective of their moral value or their spiritual] 
import. | 

While endeavouring to show that such predictions 
are to be found in the Bible, I shall not rely upon any 
disputed dates of authorship. Without making any 


The Oracles of God. 229 


assertions or admissions therefore with respect to 

various controverted matters, it will be submitted that 

even if all the dates insisted upon by the most hostile 

criticism be conceded, the Scriptures still exhibit not’ 
merely an occasional power of forecast, or a few happy 

anticipations, but a continuous and increasingly distinct 

prescience of the general course of history, and of some 

particular events by which that course has been unmis- 

takably determined. 

I pass over what is known as the Protevangelium 
(Gen. i. 15) as an oracle which admits of varied 
interpretations, and shall not dwell on the singular 
ethnological forecast attributed to Noah (Gen. ix. 25), 
although the political and moral relationships of the 
main branches of the human family have answered to 
the outline. Apart from later and more definite pre- 
dictions, these are not likely to secure conviction. If, 
however, a student finds that they stand related to 
subsequent predictions as faint glimpses of a distant 
city swathed in morning mists are related to those 
clearer views which are obtained as the traveller nears 
its gates, he will not be blind to their significance as 
indications that the human race was granted, even 
from the earliest times, some hopeful intimations of 
good things to come. 

It has already been shown that the life of Abraham 
is no mere legendary tale; but if any reader should insist 
that a true historic outline may have received sundry 
mythical embellishments, the point may be reserved 
as one to be decided by the investigation rather than 
assumed at the outset. The lowest date for the docu- 
ments in Genesis may also be taken as a basis of 


230 Lhe Mystery of God. 


discussion. The facts which still remain unquestioned 
-are quite inexplicable on natural grounds. It is in 
any case certain that the oracles which are stated in 
Genesis to have been given to Abraham were at a very 
early time believed to be Divine by his descendants. 
It is also certain that from him arose ‘an entirely 
independent’ monotheism, marked by the ‘peculiar 
name for the true God, El-Shadda.’* It is furthermore 
indisputable that faith in this ‘God of Abraham,’ and 
in the promises attributed to Him, was a fashioning 
power which did much to unite the families of Israel 
into a separate nation; that it has continued to hold 
them apart from other peoples, in an unparalleled 
manner, for more than 3,000 years, and has proved 
itself an indissoluble bond throughout nearly 2,000 
years not merely of exile, but of world-wide dispersion. ~ 

However these facts are to be explained, it is evident 
that their early anticipation by Abraham’s children 
would be as remarkable as their announcement by 
himself. If a veritable prediction can be traced back 
to the popular beliefs of the Hebrews in an age long 
anterior to its fulfilment, the precise date of the oracle 
in which it was embodied is for evidential purposes 
immaterial. If such a prediction be demonstrated, 
criticism will have no interest in contesting the exact 
time and circumstances of its original delivery. 

It is not disputed that the conviction that Abraham 
was called of God for great and world-wide purposes 
arose by some means at a very early time. The only 
question is as to whether this belief amounted to a 
superhuman prescience. It must frankly be conceded 

* Ewald, ‘ History of Israel,’ Vol. I., p. 321. 


The Oracles of God... 2a 


e) 


that a persuasion of the truth of Abraham’s creed and 
of its power to outlive all rival religions might spring up 
naturally among his descendants. An expectation that 
His posterity were eventually to become a numerous | 
and prosperous nation might also take form and acquire 
strength as sucha prospect became probable. But these 
ideas do not fairly represent the scope of Abraham’s oracle. 
Without asking whether it predicted a personal Messiah, 
it will suffice to observe that the oracle in its various 
forms points not merely to the prosperity of a nation, 
or to the spread of monotheism, but to Abraham’s 
posterity as the instrument by which God, who had 
blessed him, would in time bless all nations.* 

It will doubtless be contended that even this latter 
part of the expectation was so probable as to arise in a 
natural way. But this contention will not bear analysis. 
Of course, after a belief in the alleged promises to 
Abraham had taken root, their fulfilment would appear 
probable to all who believed them Divine; but we have 
to deal with the source of that belief, not with its re- 
sults. The question now requiring answer is whether 
such a destiny as the Hebrews anticipated for their 
race, and which by some means found expression in 
the oracle before us, was antecedently so probable as 
to be naturally foreseen, and thence in course of time 
become clothed in the form of a mythical covenant 
between Abraham and God. 

In answering this question we can afford to concede 
far more than can be justly claimed for the sagacity of 
the Hebrews. We may allow that they would very 

* See Gen. xii. 2, 3; xviii. 18, 19: xxii. 17, 185 Xxxvi. 2—5; 
XXYIll. 13, 15. : 


Zee The Mystery of God. 


early expect their sons to do much for the spread of 
their monotheism. But we cannot admit that they 
would naturally expect for their race a perpetual and 
world-wide monopoly in this work! Yet this is what 
the oracle in Genesis foretells. If all nations were 
to receive the blessing of a pure religion through 
Abraham’s posterity, no philosopher or prophet must 
rise up in any other nation to forestall the work, 
however long it might be delayed. But if, as some 
Theists contend, monotheism is only a product of the 
human reason, it was beyond all calculation probable 
that some foreigners would attain a worthy Theism 
independently of the Hebrews, and would do in other 
parts of the world what the Patriarchs and their sons 
were doing in their own sphere. When once the 
religion of the Hebrews is regarded as ‘mere natural 
theology,’ their expectations appear in the highest 
degree presumptuous and improbable. These expecta- 
tions could only conceivably arise in the minds of men 
who, in addition toa bare Theism, believed that God had 
verily spoken to Abraham and intimated the choice of 
his family, as the oracle declares. Moreover, if that 
belief was false, the probability amounted to a moral 
certainty, that events would expose its falsity, and that 
time would prove the folly of all family and national 
hopes based upon it, rather than conspire with fate to 
accord them a complete fulfilment. 

The question now arises, Have these hopes been 
fuifilled? and has the fulfilment been worked out on 
such a scale, and with such unmistakable clearness, as 
to prove the existence of a prediction? The answer is 
written large in history. Many of the most conspicuous 


The Oracles of God. ap: 


facts which have been chronicled for thousands of years 
exhibit a continuous and progressive fulfilment. Inthe 
old world Moses was the mightiest teacher, and he was 
a son of Abraham. After him came the long series 
of Hebrew psalmists and prophets, whose teachings 
were scattered by Jewish colonists and traders, by 
public synagogues and by a Greek version of the Old 
Testament, over the entire Roman empire. Chiefest 
figure in the midst of the ages came Christ, a son of 
Abraham. After Him, and preaching His message, 
came the Apostles and their helpers, who ‘turned the 
world upside down,’ and these also were Abraham’s 
seed, not only in faith but in the flesh. Mohammed, who 
has spread an adulterated monotheism over a large 
section of mankind, boasted of Abrahamic descent, and 
confessedly imbibed his Theism from an imperfect 
acquaintance with Jewish and Christian doctrines. 
The book which has been, and still is, the most potent 
influence in the modern world, was produced exclusively 
by men of Abraham’s race, and every Christian preacher 
and missionary, every Christian parent and teacher, 
takes that volume in hand as a text-book, and derives 
all his views of God and eternity, and all his moral 
counsels and spiritual persuasions, from its unrivalled 
store. To place that book within the reach of the very 
lowest of mankind not a few have spent, and many now 
are spending, their lives, in creating written languages 
for barbarous peoples; and there is to-day no speech 
nor language of any importance under the sun where 
the voices of Abraham’s children are not heard declaring 
the glory of the God he worshipped. We cannot say 
that the fulfilment of the oracle is now absolutely com- 


234 The Mystery of God. 


plete; but then the world has not yet closed its his- 
tory. We can say, however, as regards the present, 
that there is scarcely a nation in existence which has 
not partially received Abraham’s blessing; and as to 
the future, we know enough of the world and its in- 
habitants to affirm that the religious teachers of Abra- 
ham’s race are so completely in possession of the field, 
that unless an original Theism should be discovered 
among the unvisited tribes of Central Africa, or a prophet 
should spring up untaught in the midst of some savage 
people, like an oak growing spontaneously on an un- 
clothed coral reef, the entire Theism of the future 
must be the fruitage of Abraham’s seed. Such a 
family monopoly in the tuition and leadership of 
religion, maintained for thousands of years, and now 
more manifest and irreversible than ever, was abso- 
lutely beyond any human foresight. It is a fact no 
ingenuity can possibly explain away, and one which 
surely warrants our belief that the author of the oracle 
in Genesis was possessed of superhuman knowledge, and 
that the events which have wrought out its age-enduring 
accomplishment have been under the superintendence 
of Him who declared them before they came to pass. 

Working within this vast outline of religious progress 
in its relation to the spiritual faith and fleshly family of 
Abraham, the Hebrew Scriptures reiterate the funda- 
mental oracle in countless different forms. Whatever 
conclusions may be accepted as to the dates of their 
composition, or redaction, they show that the hopes of 
Abraham’s children were indestructible, surviving many 
relapses of the nation into idolatry, and many calamities 
which threatened it with extermination. 


The Oracles of God. 235 


As time elapsed, national expectations were concen- 
trated on the person of an individual servant of Jehovah. 
The collective body of the nation was to be God’s 
servant; but with increasing distinctness it was antici- 
pated that Israel’s grand work would be performed by 
one transcendent leader. In the last century Collins 
and his fellow Deists asserted that no traces of such an 
expectation are discoverable until close to the time of 
Christ; but the severity of more recent criticism has 
finally disposed of their contention. Strauss takes his 
stand on the monument which proclaims the victory of 
Christianity over Collins and his school, and proposes 
to explain the career of Christ as a conscious imper- 
sonation of the Messiah so vividly portrayed in the 
prophets and so eagerly awaited by the people in His 
day. With various modifications, this is the general 
attitude of educated unbelievers in our day. 

The most ancient Jewish writings which comment 
on the Old Testament mention no less than 456 
passages which were regarded by the Rabbins as 
Messianic; and the compiler of this list* does not re- 
gard it as exhaustive. Limited space forbids a review 
of so vast a series; but inasmuch as the prevalence of 
such prophecies is now admitted, this is scarcely a dis- 
advantage. The only evidence requisite to prove their 
superhuman character relates in a minor degree to the 
precise intention of their writers, but mainly to the 
legitimacy of their alleged fulfilment. In view of these 
facts it will be sufficient for us to take one test case. 
By universal consent the passage known as Isaiah lili. 


* Edersheim, ‘ Life and Times of Jesus the Messiah,’ Vol. II. 
Pp. 707. ‘ 


236 The Mystery of God. 


is the most important and the one on which a decisive 
"issue may be raised. 

The chapter opens with a lament over a state of 
general incredulity respecting a ‘servant of the Lord’ 
named in preceding verses, and then passes into a 
description of his unique character and career. 

The special features of this picture which require to 
be combined in any scheme of interpretation and in any 
legitimate fulfilment are : 

1. The servant is God’s arm, 7.e., in some special 
sense he is an instrument used by the Divine Will. 

2. He appears upon the scene from some obscure 
quarter, and grows up without manifesting to ordinary 
eyes the credentials of a God-sent leader. 

3. He is despised and rejected by the people, and 
is regarded by them as under a Divine curse. 

4. While thus despised by men, and apparently 
abhorred of God, he is without sin. 

5. While subjected to terrible sufferings, and at last 
put to death, he utters no complaint. 

6. His sufferings, though inflicted as penal by the 
people, are of God’s appointment, and are willingly 
endured as the healing chastisement of other men’s 
sins. 
~ 4, After he has poured out his soul in death as an 
offering for sin, he is to prolong his days, and God’s 
appointed work, which seemed to fail, is to prosper in 
his hands. | 

8. He is to be amply satisfied for all his travail by 
the mystical bringing forth of a numerous seed through 
these birth-throes of death. 

g. His future work will be of a priestly character in 


The Oracles of God. | 237 


making intercession for transgressors and justifying 
many. 

Up to the time of Christ this passage was regarded 
by all Jews as Messianic; but the exigencies of contro- 
versy with Christian apologists speedily led them to 
seek a more convenient interpretation. By many of 
their writers, and by a few others, it has been assumed 
that the passage refers to Israel as a nation, and 
describes its treatment by the Gentiles. Superficially 
viewed this theory seems plausible, but it fails to 
satisfy some of the most important conditions which 
have been enumerated—conditions, it should be ob- 
served, in which no stress is laid on verbal niceties, but 
in which the substance of the prophet’s thought is pre- 
served, though differently expressed. In common with 
all other prophecies, the second part of Isaiah denounces 
the people of Israel as full of violence and guile. The 
captivity is treated as a just punishment for wickedness, 
and the return to Zion as an undeserved mercy. While 
enduring judgment, the nation was anything but silent 
and lamb-like. Moreover, the persons who despise 
the Lord’s servant while he bears their sins are cer- 
tainly Israelites, as is proved by the prophet’s use of 
plural pronouns in the first person in confessional 
clauses, and by their description as ‘my people,’ an 
expression which cannot be mistaken. 

Those who would escape these fatal objections by 
imiting the reference to the godly part of Israel are 
scarcely happier in their attempt. Throughout the 
Old Testament writings the loudest outpourings of con- 
fession proceed from the lips of the godliest men, and 
in this chapter there is no excuse for limiting the cry, 


238 The Mystery of God. 


_ ‘All we like sheep have gone astray ; we have turned 
every one to his own way; and the Lord hath laid on 
him the iniquity of us all.’ This language corresponds 
to the rule by which the prophets identify themselves 
with the nation in its collective unity, and asa sinful body 
before God. It has also to be observed that the godly 
portion appear to have suffered far less during the exile 
than any others. Jeremiah was specially favoured by the 
King of Babylon; Daniel and his friends were exalted 
to the highest posts in the kingdom ; Ezekiel was in a 
position of honour; and other notable names at once 
suggest themselves to show that at this period the 
godly were specially favoured rather than specially 
afflicted by the Gentiles. Assuredly no prophet who 
was embued with the spirit of his ancient faith would 
be so destitute of the humility and unobtrusive meek- 
ness here lauded in ‘the servant of God’ as to claim 
for himself and his religious associates such a character, 
such functions, and such a peculiar destiny as he here 
describes. 

- To obviate these further objections, some affirm that 
the prophet meant to depict, not the actual Israel in 
whole or part, but the ideal Israel. But in what sense 
could an ‘ideal Israel’ be said to ‘grow up before’ 
God ‘as a tender plant, and as a root out of a dry 
ground,’ and to have ‘no form or comeliness’? Such 
a description is inapplicable to an ideal, whether con- 
sidered as resident in the mind of God or in the minds 
of men. A Divine ideal can only be thought of as 
a perfect image or mental pattern of something after- 
wards to be produced ; but it is by definition a thing of 
perfect beauty from the beginning. Similarly a human 


The Oracles of God. 239 


ideal is always something high and beautiful in the 
imaginations of real people, and is contemplated by 
them as an object of aspiration. How, then, can this — 
‘ideal Israel’ be ‘despised and rejected of men,’ and © 
‘as one from whom men hide their face’? An ideal, if 
it can be said to live at all, lives beyond the range of 
sorrows and grinding burdens; it is the real man who 
suffers for sin and is afflicted for his own and his neigh- 
bours’ crimes, while his ideal floats before his chastened 
mind as a vision of what might have been his actual 
estate. How, then, can an ideal Israel be conceived of 
as bearing the griefs of the real, as wounded for their 
transgressions and bruised for their iniquities? In 
what mysterious sense can chastisement be laid on an 
‘ideal’ so that it shall mistakenly be deemed ‘ stricken 
of God and afflicted’ asa punishment for its own sins ? 
Similar questions will occur to every careful reader 
clause by clause throughout the chapter. There is, 
indeed, no way in which this matchless passage can be 
sensibly construed except by taking the plural pro- 
nouns to denote the people of Israel, who confess their 
wickedness and bemoan their blind injustice towards a 
righteous friend who suffered for their sakes; and 
the singular pronouns to refer to the same individual 
servant of God who endures contempt and death at 
their hands, yet rises up from death to see of the 
travail of his soul, to prolong his days, and be satisfied 
in his seed. | 

The impossibility of avoiding this conclusion is now 
generally confessed, and various individuals have been 
proposed as specially answering to the picture of ‘the 
servant of the Lord.’ Hezekiah, Josiah, Isaiah, Jere- 


240 The Mystery of God. 


miah, with others still more unsuitable, have been 
‘named, but none have found acceptance. It seems 
idle to controvert theories which simply catch at one 
or two out of many particulars, and ignore the gran- 
deur of the outline and the most prominent features of 
the figure painted by the prophet. These were all 
great men, and far above the usual standard of good- 
ness; but none were great or influential enough to 
occupy so large a space in the prophet’s mind, and 
none were so righteous as to be lauded in such terms. 
If, as we are so confidently assured, the passage was 
written in the captivity, Hezekiah, Josiah, and Isaiah 
had been long dead; and had it been the prophet’s 
purpose to magnify them, it might have been done by 
name. But what prophet could have been so infatuated 
as to imagine that these departed worthies, who were 
for the most part greatly honoured in life, were to have 
such a post-mortem career as the last verses describe ? 
With regard to Jeremiah, he no doubt endured great 
afflictions at the hands of his countrymen; but apart 
from other disqualifications which he shared with the 
best of Israelites, he would scarcely have inspired the 
exquisite image of a lamb led in silence to the slaughter ! 
To identify the author of the ‘ Lamentations,’ and of | 
those passionate protests which abound in his larger 
book, with the subject of Isaiah lii., is indeed a literary 
curiosity. Did the advocates of this theory never hear 
of ‘a Jeremiad ?’ 

In dismissing these theories as futile endeavours to 
get rid of a distinctly predictive element, it is not said 
that they contain no valuable thoughts, or that their 
authors are blind to some of the deepest truths which 


The Oracles of God. 241 


underlie the chapter. It is not necessary to deny that 
Israel as a nation has been a great sufferer on behalf of 
the world, or that by her afflictions several precious 
and purifying principles have been made plain to man- . 
kind. On the contrary, all who have grasped the 
Biblical conception of Israel’s place in history, and 
have considered how remarkably the actual facts cor- 
respond to this idea, will readily concede that, for the 
world’s good, God has laid on his chosen people a 
tremendous burden. 

Again, it need not be denied that the godly portion 
of Israel suffered grievously through the sins of their 
countrymen, nor that these sufferings were productive 
of much good. There were many martyrs in Israel, 
and in their degree they bore the iniquities of God’s 
people. To these men also it was given to apprehend 
with superior clearness the mission of Abraham’s 
children and the costliness of the service to which they 
were called. They saw that it demanded for its accom- 
plishment a rare degree of gentleness and meekness, 
and a willingness to be persecuted and slain. There 
was an ideal Israel floating before the minds of the 
holiest men—as there is an ideal Church before the 
thoughts of Christ’s disciples now—a spiritual nation, 
a glorious city such as never man upreared, and which 
can only come to earth from above. 

We may go a step further, and allow, or, if needful, 
insist, that in all this the best men of Abraham’s race 
perceived the working of a Divine and therefore a 
universal law. Every man and woman in the world 
who bravely endures hardship for the sake of truth and 
right ; every victim of injustice, and of that blind scorn 

16 


242 The Mystery of God. 


which evil souls cherish for meekness and purity ; every 
sympathetic heart which bleeds or breaks with grief on 
account of a beloved but guilty country, or family, or 
friend, does in some partial way fulfil this royal law 
of sacrifice, and is in a measure God’s servant, and 
answers to some lineaments of the Messiah. 

But the recognition of these truths still leaves the 
chapter uninterpreted. The question which tortured 
earnest servants of God in the times of the prophets 
was, How could the destiny of Abraham’s children be 
fulfilled? How might the glorious purpose for which 
God was calling them to His service be accomplished ? 
They felt themselves to be utterly incapable of the 
appointed task. The nation had sometimes appeared 
to be on the eve of a great epoch, but, as in the 
days of Caleb, the people turned back from the very 
borders of the land they had approached. Amid the. 
splendours of Solomon’s reign there seemed to dawn a 
day which promised to bring about those hopes of peace 
and power which David sang of in his psalms. But 
behind the material glory moral decay and national dis- 
ruption were at work, and history seemed for centuries 
to be a mockery of those expectations. When a just 
and devout king like Hezekiah began to flourish, and 
the people were to some extent reformed, good men 
were ready to ask, ‘ Art thou He that should come ?’ but 
events speedily answered for each man in turn, ‘I am 
not.’ After each momentary disappointment prophetic 
‘souls began to ‘look for another,’ and another; each 
waxing and waning of hope making plain some further 
lesson respecting the conditions which must meet in the 
God-sent servant who was to be the glory of Israel 


The Oracles of God. 243 


and a light for all nations. More and more clearly 
it appeared that unbelief and disobedience were the 
great impediments. The best kings and prophets failed, 
because with all their zeal they were too truly partakers © 
of the general sin and infirmity to have sufficient 
spiritual energy to cleanse the hearts of the people, or 
lift them up to the level of their duty and privileges. 
Centuries taught them to despair of any real accom- 
plishment of their God-appointed task without a leader 
who should be divinely commissioned and endowed, 
and in whom God would so truly be the worker, that his 
advent would be God’s visitation of His people. From 
such a being indescribable blessings might be expected, 
and from Jerusalem as his central seat and capital, light 
and truth, judgment and mercy, must needs go forth 
to transform the world. But with this sublime hope 
there was also revealed a truth which the highest 
prophets only grasped with troubled, trembling minds. 
They were taught that even this predestined servant of 
God would not achieve his purpose without a process 
of suffering. He, too, must live under the great law of 
sacrifice, and become himself its great, and in the perfect 
sense its sole, fulfiller. In many places a mysterious 
blending of shame and glory, rejection and attraction, 
defeat and victory, death and endless life, perplexes the 
reader of Hebrew prophecy, as it astonished the men 
who wrote the visions. But nowhere is the com- 
mingling so manifestly centred in one person as in this 
chapter lili. of Isaiah; and nowhere is the manner of the 
sufferings and their true cause and nature, or the 
ultimate secret of triumph by their means, so definitely 
exhibited, and the order of events so vividly foretold. 
16-2 


244 The Mystery of God. 


The servant of God was not to be a foreign visitor, 
without relationship or resemblance to the prophets 
and kings who came before and did some preliminary 
work. He was to come and live under the same moral 
and social laws as they, and to do his work under the 
same conditions of affliction, ill-usage, and death. He 
was not to be at once established as a heavenly guest, 
but to grow up as ‘a tender plant,’ a lowly, sorrowful 
man. But while outwardly an ordinary man, he was to 
transcend his predecessors in every other respect. He 
was to be righteous in life and pure in spirit, as none of 
hem had been. His sufferings were to exceed theirs, 
but he would never be weakened inwardly by the sense 
of personal guilt, nor would the moral quality and 
influence of his sufferings on others, and before God, be 
impaired by the least transgression. As God subjected 
him to this sacrificial endurance of Israel’s iniquities, so 
God would vindicate his character, deliver him from 
death, and accord him a career of moral conquest, 
wherein the destiny of Abraham’s seed would be 
fulfilled and many nations be purified from sin. 

In considering the fulfilment of this prophecy, two 
special features demand some comment. It has been 
shown that the people for whom the servant of the 
Lord was primarily to suffer death are unmistakably 
Israelites; but this does not forbid a widening of the 
thought so as to include many Gentiles in the benefits 
of His sufferings. The prophet’s amazement and shame 
are peculiarly excited by the fact that the Messiah 
comes to His own, but His own receive Him not; yet he 
most distinctly foretells that all the earth will eventually 
share in the salvation to be wrought. Just before 


The Oracles of God. 245 


(li1. 15), he has declared that this marred Son of man 
shall ‘sprinkle many nations ;’ and elsewhere (xlix. 6) 
he. represents God as saying to Him: ‘It is too light a 
thing that Thou shouldest be My servant to raise up the 
tribes of Jacob, and to restore the preserved of Israel: 
I will also give Thee for a light to the Gentiles, that 
Thou mayest be My Salvation unto the end of the 
earth.’ This language convincingly shows that Israel, 
including the more godly remnant, was to be saved by 
the Messiah, but that He was also to fulfil the promise 
to Abraham by becoming a blessing to all nations. 

To this conclusion the closing words of chapter liu. 
correspond. The resuscitated servant is to bring 
forth a seed which shall satisfy the travail of his soul. 
This does not point to a physical posterity, but to a 
spiritual family. The travail is of the ‘soul,’ and it is 
on account of sin. Hence the generation to arise must 
be a multitude of men and women of like mind and 
character with himself, and their birth is the same 
thing as their justification ‘ by his knowledge,’ viewed 
as the commencement of a new and holy life. 

It is not surprising that the Jews failed to discern the 
full spiritual significance of this passage, and were 
unable to construct a satisfactory scheme of interpreta- 
tion before Christ came. But, with the facts before our 
eyes, it requires no straining of a single clause or term 
to recognise its profound agreement with Christ’s 
teachings about the necessity of a new spiritual birth 
for Jewish rulers and teachers in common with pub- 
licans, sinners, and Gentiles; with all the doctrines of 
the epistles which are developed from His speech; and 
with the facts of Christian life as a new type of character 


246 The Mystery of Gye 


introduced into the world by Christ, and propagated 
by means of that Gospel which conveys to mankind 
the knowledge of what He said and did and suffered. 

A second feature of the prophecy requiring notice is 
the vividness with which details are wrought into a vast 
outline sketch. In former times these details were 
much insisted upon, but are now perhaps less consi- 
dered than they deserve. In a lightly-drawn portrait 
an artist never attempts to give a minute facsimile of 
every line and wrinkle, yet a satisfactory general effect 
cannot be produced without some very precise delinea- 
tions of separate features. The evidence of skill in the 
artist, and of the fact that he has drawn from nature, 
will be found in the success with which these touches 
are made to appear as portions of the first bold sketch, 
and are freed from any traces of additional labour or 
careful afterthought. When compared with the living 
subject the general likeness will first be seen ; but point 
by point a critic will observe how the most charac- 
teristic traits, and especially any unusual forms, have 
been seized upon and reproduced. If this canon of 
criticism be applied to the prophetic sketch of the 
Messiah and His times as compared with the Person 
and career of Christ, it will be found that while the 
broad outline of the central figure answers to His 
image, and its accessories to the effects He has pro- 
duced throughout vast ages; yet the same bold lines 
which produce this general effect are exquisitely true to 
many details which single Him out as an individual 
from all the sons of men. 

We do not exceed the admissions of contemporary 
criticism when we affirm that the verisimilitude of the 


The Oracles of God. 247 


antique portrait to the Person and career of Jesus, as 
He appears in the gospel narratives, has been esta- 
blished. Nota false stroke of the brush or an untrue 
tint in the colouring can be detected. In the course of 
eighteen hundred years countless authors of the most 
diversified gifts, training, and opportunities have con- 
secrated their lives to the supreme task of showing 
forth the excellencies of this holy sufferer, and yet with 
all the materials at their command, and although many 
of them have possessed consummate literary ability, 
and not a few have displayed transcendent genius, no 
one has produced a sermon or poem which is worthy 
to be compared with the picture drawn by Isaiah or 
‘some great Unknown,’ many centuries before Christ’s 
birth. 

There are, therefore, only two ways in which the in- 
ference drawn by Christians from this phenomenon 
can be resisted. It may be contended that the gospel 
narratives are not true; or, accepting many of their 
features, it may be alleged that Jesus studied the 
Messianic part, and played it with amazing skill before 
the world. Unless one of these grave charges can be 
sustained, the conclusion is irresistible that in Isaiah liu. 
we have a verified oracle of God. 

The questions now stated will form the subject of the 
two succeeding chapters. Pending their discussion, 
our conclusion as to Messianic predictions can only be 
provisional; but nothing can alter the fact that the 
oracle concerning Abraham’s seed has been fulfilled, or 
that it has been fulfilled instrumentally through Christ. 
Whatever His actual character and nature, He was the 
evening star of the old world and the morning star of 


248 The Mystery of God. 


the new. For ages such a mighty son of Isaac and 
David was looked for, and good men said, ‘ He will 
come,’ but no prince or prophet said, ‘I am the 
Christ.’ At last One stands up to say, ‘I that speak 
unto you am He.’ And either by the will of a benig- 
nant God, or the working of a malignant and torment- 
ing fate, the nations have received their law from His 
mouth, and every continent and island is vocal with 
His praise as the Son of God. His countrymen, who 
fulfilled their predicted part by despising and putting 
Him to death, have endured the fate which also was 
foretold in the loss of their country and the desolation 
of that temple in which alone their priests could 
minister and their sacrificial offerings be made. In the 
midst of time the Person of Christ thus stands as one 
who fulfilled the most mysterious expectations of 
antiquity, and has become the foundation on which the 
modern world has built its hopes. The questions at 
issue about His Person are therefore very definite and 
very narrow in their compass, yet they touch the 
centre and core of the world’s religious history. If 
that centre be not a truth, history is one huge fraud, and 
the spectre of Pessimism gibes at us in the darkness 
into which our minds are plunged. 


Section VIII.—The Prevalence of Divine Elements in the 
Bible. 


Before proceeding to put these Messianic predictions 
to their final test by an examination of their asserted 
fulfilment in the Person of Jesus of Nazareth, some re- 
marks may be offered with regard to the prevalence of 
Divine elements in Scripture. The foregoing predic- 


Lhe Oracles of God. 249 


tions have been submitted as samples only of an exten- 
sive class; but if these are fairly established, no diff- 
culty can be felt respecting the vast series of prophecies 
to which they stand related. Careful study may » 
question the soundness of much Rabbinical and 
Christian exegesis, and may fail to find Messianic 
allusions in some passages where they are commonly 
supposed to exist. But when once convinced that the 
Bible contains predictions which transcend human 
foresight, the most cautious mind will approve a more 
receptive standard of criticism than would otherwise 
be tolerated, and will recognise what is more significant 
than any separate oracle, viz., that the older Scriptures 
are saturated with the thought of a future Prince and 
Saviour, who would establish a kingdom of righteous- 
ness and piety in the whole earth. 

Furthermore, it should be observed that, although 
predictive oracles alone have been selected for the pur- 
poses of proof, the Divine elements in the Bible cannot 
be limited to this one form. The existence of true 
prophecy reflects a more than earthly lustre on the 
teachings of which it forms an integral part, and en- 
joins upon all who confess its presence a profound re- 
spect for whatever statements or practical lessons may 
be offered by its human organs. These men nowhere 
describe themselves, or one another, as infallible in 
their intellectual judgments or in moral character; but 
their selection to be the stewards of Divine oracles 
for the benefit of mankind is a seal upon the truth of 
their general pretensions, exalts them to a unique place 
in our esteem, and justifies us in giving an amount of 
credence to their words which would otherwise be 


250 The Mystery of God. 


superstitious. Many of their statements are utterly in- 
- capable of proof or disproof; but if reasonably assured 
that the speakers were called of God to be the religious 
pioneers of our race, we shall not demand a positive 
and independent corroboration of every utterance. 
Being once convinced that they certainly received 
some oracles from God, we shall not deem it wise or 
right to suspect them of fraud or illusion when they 
tell us of other communications, the divinity of which 
cannot now be demonstrated. 

It is often assumed that if it can be shown that a 
given portion of the Bible might conceivably have been 
produced by the ordinary use of man’s faculties, it is 
thereby proved to be a human production and nothing 
more. Such an argument, however, will not bear ex- 
amination. Without forsaking the position that the 
Creator is not likely to do for men what they are 
competent to do for themselves, it is possible to name 
certain conditions under which He might wisely com- 
municate some truths which were not necessarily 
undiscoverable by the human intellect. 

It is not impossible, nor, to those who regard God 
as man’s Ruler, should it seem improbable, that He 
would deem it well to deliver oracles of a practical and 
hortatory character, such as human moralists might 
conceivably have formulated. This would not be doing 
what man could do for himself. The decrees of an 
_ emperor or the enactments of a Senate may contain 
nothing in advance of what multitudes previously 
thought and practised; but as laws they possess a 
distinct character and function which could not belong 
to them in any other form. So sundry moral precepts, 


The Oracles of God. 251 


said to have been given by the Creator, may be shown 
to have their precise counterparts in sagacious maxims 
framed by heathen philosophers, without any real 
doubt being cast on their Divine publication. The 
moral commandments of God would presumably cor- 
respond to the purest dictates of man’s conscience and 
to the wisest conclusions drawn from experience, but 
if expressly delivered as divine injunctions, they would 
impose peculiar obligations on their hearers. This re- 
mark has an important bearing on the laws known as 
the Decalogue. Nearly all these commandments 
(though assuredly not the first) are such as human 
wisdom might have devised; and similar precepts are 
not unknown in heathen literature. But, in opposition 
to a much reiterated argument, I would submit that 
this fact does not disprove that such commands were 
specially communicated to Moses from above, any more 
than a Royal edict is proved to be spurious by its 
agreement with popular opinion, or than meteoric 
stones are proved to have an earthly origin when it is 
discovered that the elements of which they are com- 
posed are such as abound in our own globe. The 
teaching of the Apostle Paul on this matter is not that 
the Jews alone were acquainted with the moral law, 
but that they were placed under peculiar obligations 
for its fulfilment by the clearness and authority with 
which it was imparted to them through Moses; and 
that this special moral responsibility was imposed upon 
them as chosen exemplars of God’s treatment of dis- 
obedience, and as the stewards of a Divine revelation 
of mercy and redemption. 

If for such purposes God were to solemnly promul- 


252 The Mystery of God. 


gate laws which were already written in the conscience, 

_or were deducible from the facts of experience, He would 
certainly not be doing what man could do for himself. 
When, moreover, it is remembered how universally 
the teachings of conscience have been blurred by ill- 
usage, and how wofully the lessons of experience have 
been misread, it can scarcely be accounted superfluous 
for Him to provide through an inspired lawgiver a clear 
objective expression of His will, and to enforce its ob- 
servance upon His chosen servants with exemplary 
sanctions for a season. It is not now asserted that 
He did pursue this course, for such an assertion would 
require to be supported by reasonings for which there 
is no space. But it is contended that the Divine 
origin of the moral laws ascribed to God in the Bible 
cannot be disproved by a mere analysis of their contents. 
Hence those who are convinced that God has really 
spoken to men, are within the bounds of reason and 
probability when they accept as Divine some things 
which may not be demonstrably superhuman in their 
nature. 

A further reason for accepting this conclusion may 
be found in the fact that things which are really 
or apparently within the present powers of human 
reason may have altogether transcended those powers 
at an earlier period of history. It is also quite possible 
that man’s existing capacity for religious thought is in 
part a product of bygone revelations which he is now 
requested to ignore. The teachings of analogy would 
certainly encourage the belief that these possibilities 
coincide with the actual facts of the case. An earthly 
father reveals to his children many things which in 


The Oracles of God. 253 


later life they might readily discover for themselves, 
but which are none the less indispensable for their 
earliest guidance. It will also be admitted that, apart 
from these elementary revelations, the reason would 
remain in an infantile and almost dormant condition, 
and so come short of that ability which ultimately 
seems to make it independent. 

It might not be difficult to show that this principle 
really does apply to the religious education of the race. 
There are some beautiful and sublime ideas which 
devout Theists, who deny revelation, seem to regard 
as having risen up from the wells of consciousness 
within them, or as the necessary conclusions of the in- 
tellect, but which have in fact been inherited through 
a series of oral or written revelations from historic 
sources indicated in the Bible. It is true, as Professor 
Flint has ably proved against Sir John Lubbock,* that 
no peoples have yet been discovered without some idea 
of a Superior Power. But it is also true, and is capable 
of historic proof, that no worthy ideas of God—none 
which the Theists in question would care to identify 
with their own, are known to have existed where the 
influence of Hebrew monotheism was demonstrably or 
even probably absent. Assuredly no Theist who has 
been taught by his parents to cherish the scriptural 
idea of God, or who has read the Bible, or any book in 
which Biblical ideas are expressed, is entitled to say 
that he has reached his present position by an indepen- 
dent process of reasoning. He might as well pretend 
to have discovered for himself that the world isa globe, 
and that it revolves around the sun because these pro- 

* ‘Anti-Theistic Theories,’ Lecture VII. 


254 The Mystery of God. 


positions are now felt to be natural and certain conclu- 
_ sions of the intellect. 

The arguments which are intended to establish the 
sufficiency of human reason to account for worthy 
Theistic ideas will be found, on examination, only to 
prove that man is capable of receiving a revelation from 
either his fellow-man or from God; and that he is so 
well able to appreciate the beauty and fitness of a great 
truth when duly offered and reflected upon, that the 
thing revealed may presently seem to be a necessary 
conclusion of his intellect, if not an innate idea. 
Whether man in his present state of culture would 
be able to think out a satisfactory Theistic theory 
is a problem we have no means of deciding. No 
one can say what the residuum would be if the 
minds, let us say of modern Englishmen, could be 
swept clear of all the religious ideas they owe to some 
kind of revelation; and if all the spiritual yearnings, 
moral sentiments, and social affections which have 
been engendered or fostered by ‘second-hand’ beliefs 
were obliterated or proportionately reduced. What 
sort of religion an Englishman in this plight would de- 
vise it is impossible to imagine, but we may fairly sup- 
pose that it would be very unlike the ‘ Rational Re- 
ligion ’ of those Theists who walk in the light of Chris- 
tianity and declare their independence of its Sun! 
What they can do, or what they think to be within their 
present powers, is no criterion of what unaided reason 
might accomplish. The question is whether, in those 
early days to which Theism can historically be traced, 
man could have achieved the task now deemed so easy. 
Unless this question be answered in the affirmative, 


The Oracles of God. 255 


and that answer can be sustained by arguments and 
evidences such as no one has yet propounded, the 
probability remains that some truths which men now 
feel competent to ascertain without a revelation were - 
formerly above man’s powers, if they are not actually 
so now. Hence, if some parts of the Bible are shown to 
be Divine and others human, we are at least entitled to 
affirm that our powers are not fine enough to discern a 
complete line of demarcation between them, and that 
very much more may be Divine than a believer can 
prove. Wecan no more divide the one from the other 
with precision than an individual can so analyse his 
own thoughts as to separate the things he has dis- 
covered for himself from the things he received from 
other minds in infancy and youth. 

It may be well to call attention to what at first sight 
may seem a contradiction between these statements 
and others made on p. 206. It should be noticed that 
in the previous instance I was considering exclusively 
the difficulties of Christians, and my endeavour was to 
show that a believer in the Bible as a God-given book 
can, for all practical purposes, discern between the 
Divine and human in its contents. In this place I have 
in view the criticisms of those to whom a ‘ Thus saith 
the Lord’ has no weight. The question here is not 
what a believer can find out for his own satisfaction, 
and by methods which to faith are quite legitimate, 
but what he can do in the way of proof for other 
minds; and the object is to show that he is not ir- 
rational when, having found some oracles which mani- 
festly exhibit superhuman knowledge, he also reveres 
as ‘the Word of God’ many other utterances, the 


256 The Mystery of God. 


nature of which cannot be demonstrated in the same 
way. 

One other reason for concluding that some things 
may be Divine which are not demonstrably super- 
human has yet to be stated. Not only does the 
power of discovering and expressing religious truth 
vary in different ages of the world, and in different 
stages of individual growth, but the power of perceiving 
what has already been discovered and expressed varies 
also. 

In no department of knowledge can any instructor 
show us what our faculties have not been appropriately 
or sufficiently exercised to discern. The most luminous 
writer on mathematical science cannot demonstrate an 
advanced theorem to one who is still struggling to cross 
the pons asinorum. It requires scholarship to discern 
the highest marks of culture in an author or orator, 
although the untutored may feel his superiority. The 
multitude may admire a fine painting or statue, but 
only artistic taste and technical knowledge can dis- 
criminate the more delicate marks of transcendent 
genius. The finest poems may have wondrous charm 
for immature and undisciplined minds, but only those 
who have passed through manifold experiences of joy 
and sorrow can recognise the mastery of a great poet 
over the workings of human passion, or be filled with 
‘exquisite music’ when his words play with mystic 
touch upon the highest chords of emotional thought. 
If this be so in relation to the works of human learning 
and art, a similar preparedness must be required for 
the discernment of many things which appeal to man’s 
more spiritual faculties. Most men feel the beauty and 


Lhe Oracles of God. 257 


moral power of the old Hebrew psalmists and prophets, 
but only those who have undergone some agonizing 
moral conflicts, and have lifted up ‘lame hands of faith’ 
to seize the help of One who knows and pities, yet is 
Holy, can read the deeper meanings of their language. 
The men who most freely find in them the teachings of 
God are they who have long striven to speak to Him 
who is invisible, and have waited with humbled hearts 
and troubled souls for answer. The evidence which 
most intensely satisfies such natures can never be trans- 
ferred. They declare that while they read the Bible 
its words become like eyes which read their thoughts, 
and like lips which speak to their hearts with most 
amazing power. Writers who have lain in foreign 
graves for ages seem more familiar with their secret 
things than are their most intimate companions, and 
have so truly anticipated their deepest thoughts as to 
provide a language for otherwise unutterable groanings 
of remorse and prayer, and for yearnings of hope and 
love and praise which had else been dumb. As they 
close the book and arise to do its commandments, 
they find themselves beset by the outward difficulties 
and the inward infirmities of which it has forewarned 
them. The more thoroughly they obey its harder say- 
ings, the deeper is their peace of mind, and the calmer 
their assurance of fellowship with One ‘that confirmeth 
the word of His servant, and performeth the counsel of 
His messengers.’ | 

To men who thus put the Bible to the severest imagin- 
able test—the test of practical obedience in momentous 
business—the book becomes more like a living .Coun- 
sellor and Friend than a printed volume. Its words 

17 


258 The Mystery of God. 


become more precious than their necessary food, be- 
_ cause the nourishment of pure affections, great pur- 
poses, high courage, and exalted hopes. In sorrow 
they are fraught with consolation, and in joy with 
sobering wisdom. In the hour of failure they whisper 
thoughts of new and eternal possibilities; in victory 
they preach humbleness ; in the midst of conflict they 
are like the voice of a great commander calling to his 
troops; while to the wounded who lie prone upon the 
battlefield their tones are tenderly compassionate, yet 
full of healing mercy and reviving hope. To those who 
have experienced these things, mere logical proofs of 
superhuman knowledge in the Bible are irksome and 
needless. To those who know of them only by report, 
no exposition can convey such impressions as they 
produce. | 

It may be demurred by readers who lack such con- 
victions, that these private and incommunicable per- 
suasions have no logical place in this discussion. It is 
freely conceded that they are not direct evidence of 
Divine elements in the Bible; they are expressly intro- 
duced as things ‘which never can be proved ;’ but they 
have, notwithstanding, a distinct logical value. In dis-. 
cussing the chemical or medicinal properties of a given 
substance, investigators will not shut their eyes to any 
effects which it is alleged to have produced. If those 
who eat or drink of it, or apply it to their bodies 
externally, profess themselves to be thereby pained or 
comforted, science will not refuse to register their 
experience. But if some analyst were to ridicule 
their experience because of his inability to explain 
it, or because, owing to some different conditions of 


_ Lhe Oracles of God. 259 


health, he may feel no similar effects, the persons who 
have made repeated experiments will be justly com- 
mended for abiding in their own beliefs. On the same 
principle, the testimony of those who make the Bible 
their chief study and their supreme guide will not be 
passed over by a ‘rational sceptic’ as uninstructive. 
The intense conviction of Divine enlightenment, in- 
vigoration, comfort, guidance, and moral constraint 
which grows up in the minds of myriads of Christian 
men and women is a phenomenon of unparalleled 
character, and should command the respectful attention 
of all who would study the mystery of human life in a 
scientific spirit. It forbids hasty denials, and counsels 
patient study of the facts in that childlike spirit which 
Science and Faith unite to approve. It also powerfully 
recommends such a practical experiment in the way of 
life prescribed by the Bible as will correspond to those 
physical tests whereby theories are verified in the 
sphere of material things. Whatever value, however, 
may be attached to the prevalence of such a con- 
viction by a too self-reliant criticism, those who have 
attained it would be utterly irrational if they con- 
sented to renounce the accumulated teachings of expe- 
rience. 

At the close of Section II. it was observed that the 
phenomena there indicated have never been accounted 
for except on the supposition that a Higher Mind pre- 
sided over the production of the Bible, but that their 
chief importance could only be seen in conjunction 
with some other facts. We are now in a position to 
take a somewhat wider view, although the force of 
what is said at this stage will be immeasurably increased 

I7—2 


260 The Mystery of God. 


if the propositions which still await discussion are 
established. 


When the actual presence of Divine oracles in the — 


Bible has been established to our satisfaction, the sur- 
prising unity of its collected books assumes a new 
significance. The phenomena which have already 
been exhibited seem in any case to indicate that the 
authors of these books were inspired and supervised 
by one Mind, which remained while they were changed, 
and still taught them each their portion as they went 
from birth to death, and passed in slow procession 
down the ages. But when it is found that these 
men, so widely sundered by gulfs of time and 
seas of changing circumstance, were bound together 
as fellow-workers, not only by those links which have 
been reviewed, but by a mysterious power of antici- 
pation, that unity becomes unspeakably significant. 
We have seen not only that the later writers of 
Scripture quote and supplement the utterances of 
their predecessors, but also that the earlier writers 
foretell events which in part their successors describe 
and attest as eye-witnesses, and in part repeat and 
amplify as fellow-prophets century after century, and 
in the face of the most terrible discouragements. We 
have seen that, taken altogether, these authors furnish 
not only, as formerly stated, a coherent conception of 
the past and prospective history of the human race, but 
also a true and vivid prediction of events which are still 
being wrought out in world-wide transformations of 
thought and life, and by the precise agency foretold. — 
The unity which thus includes the gradual unfolding of 
such superhuman knowledge draws a circle of consecra- 


The Oracles of God. 261 


tion round the entire production which we call the Bible. 
It does not require us to believe, nor does it even sug- 
gest, that its Divine contents have reached us without 
bearing traces of the human channels through which 
the communication comes; but it surely warrants the 
conclusion that the book as a whole is God’s gift to 
mankind; that, with all its characteristics, it is what 
He meant it to be; and that wherein it may partake of 
human limitations, this also is by His permission, and 
because in His sight it is more useful so than otherwise. 
The ascertained existence of heavenly treasure in an 
‘earthen vessel’ does not exempt the vessel from 
earthly conditions when it happens to be a book, any 
more than in the estimation of the prophets and 
apostles their abundant revelations made them infal- 
lible as men. But the presence of such a treasure in a 
volume so remarkably prepared for its gradual impar- 
tation, and subsequent preservation and dissemination, 
may well be deemed to sanctify that book, and to 
make it as a whole most truly sacred in the eyes of 
men. 


CHAPTER: Vill. 
THE PERSON OF CHRIST. 


So many vague and sweeping statements have been 
made in recent years about the mythical character of 
the gospels, that it may not be superfluous to show 
how certain and definite is our knowledge of the main 
facts of Christ’s life, and how exclusively the more 
scholarly assailants of the gospel narratives restrict 
their attack to alleged supernatural elements. 

Renan, in the introduction to his ‘Life of Jesus,’ 
writes an eloquent paragraph in which he declares how 
a residence in Palestine impressed him with the 
intense and veracious realism of the gospel narratives. 
‘I have traversed,’ he observes, ‘in all directions, the 
country of the gospels; I have visited Jerusalem, 
Hebron, and Samaria; scarcely any important locality 
of the history of Jesus has escaped me. All this 
history, which at a distance seems to float in the 
clouds of an unreal world, thus took a form, a solidity, 
which astonished me. The striking agreement of the ~ 
texts with the places, the marvellous harmony of the 
gospel ideal with the country which served it as a 
framework, were like a revelation to me. I had before 
my eyes a fifth gospel, torn, but still legible, and 
henceforward, through the recitals of Matthew and 


The Person of Christ. 263 


Mark, in place of an abstract being, whose existence 
might have been doubted, I saw living and moving an 
admirable human figure. During the summer, having 
to go up to Ghazir, in Lebanon, to take a little repose, © 
I fixed in rapid sketches the image which had appeared 
to me, and from them resulted this history.’* 

Renan is not alone in feeling the matchless charm of 
the picture drawn by the four evangelists, or the irre- 
sistible conviction that their portrait was painted from 
real life. The peculiarity of his position is that he 
should ask the world to receive a ‘fifth gospel,’ 
written by a Parisian of the nineteenth century, as 
more credible and trustworthy than either of those 
written by Hebrews in the first, and written so 
admirably as to make Christ live before his own 
sceptical eyes with intense vividness in the very spot 
where any marks of untruthfulness would have become 
more apparent. 

Such a statement from so prejudiced a quarter is not 
without its value, but the historic quality of the gospels 
is independent of any such admissions. The Jews them- 
selves have never disputed the life and death of Jesus, 
or that He did many mighty works, and was crucified 
when Pilate was governor of Jerusalem. Renan ac- 
cepts the celebrated passage in Josephus in which he 
refers to Jesus: but as its genuineness has been im- 
pugned, it may be left unquoted. The opinions of 
Jewish writers, however, have been freely expressed, 
and the testimony of loving disciples is corroborated 
by the witness of bitter foes. For centuries the 
Rabbins continued to write of Christ with venomous 


* ‘Life of Jesus,’ p. 31. 


264 The Mystery of God. 


hatred, and to ascribe His miracles to Satanic agency, 
as the evangelists tell us their fathers did during His 
lifetime. In the present day, at any rate in England, 
a more Christlike treatment of the Jewish people seems 
to have been answered by a kindlier and humbler 
attitude on their part towards Christ. Many take 
great interest in the gospels, and esteem the crucifixion 
of Jesus a crime of crimson dye. 

Besides the testimony of Jews, Latin authors may 
be cited, who, as Pagans, offer a third and independent 
body of evidence. Suetonius, referring to an Imperial 
edict issued in the year A.D. 53, states that Claudius 
‘expelled the Jews from Rome’ because ‘constantly 
raising disturbances at the instigation of Chrestus.’ 
‘Tacitus, writing of Nero’s persecution, enters more into 
detail. Charged by the Roman people with the crime 
of setting fire to the city, this infamous tyrant sought 
to fasten the guilt of his own act upon Christians. 
Concerning this Tacitus observes: ‘Christus, the 
founder of that name, was put to death as a criminal 
by Pontius Pilate, Procurator of Judea, in the reign of 
Tiberius; but the pernicious superstition, repressed for 
a time, broke out again, not only through Judea, where 
the mischievous sect arose, but through the city of 
Rome also, whither all things horrible and disgraceful 
flow from all quarters as to a common receptacle, and 
where they are encouraged. Accordingly, first those 
were seized who confessed they were Christians; next, 
on their information, a vast multitude were convicted, 
not so much on the charge of burning the city, as of 
hating the human race. In their deaths they were 
also made the subjects of sport, for they were covered 


SESS Ea: 


- cc 4 ae : 20 res 
Fb il acelin gE 2 Dy Pi Ie 


wet fe Pe ee 
os ite: et Se -" _ 
at ett iat 


at 


a we 3 > “,- iG e > =“ Sy 4 inl 
Bares Relate mae neat ah cae hd Ma ha 


Lhe Person of Christ. 265 


with the hides of wild beasts, and worried to death by 
dogs, or set fire to, and when day declined were used 
as torches to illumine the darkness of night.’* 

Commenting on this passage, Gibbon remarks: ‘ The > 
most sceptical criticism is obliged to accept the truth 
of this extraordinary fact, and the integrity of this 
celebrated passage of Tacitus. The former is con- 
firmed by the diligent and accurate Suetonius. . 
the latter by the consent of the most ancient manu- 
scripts; by the inimitable character of the style of 
Tacitus; by his reputation, which guarded the text 
from the interpolations of pious fraud; and by the 
purport of his narration, which accused the first 
Christians of the most atrocious crimes without in- 
sinuating that they possessed any miraculous or even 
magical powers above the rest of mankind.’t 

It is needless to discuss here the baselessness of the 
accusations repeated by Tacitus. The animus he dis- 
plays renders his evidence the more valuable in some 
respects, and no one now imagines that the primitive 
Christians were enemies to mankind, as he supposed. 
This testimony might suffice for our purpose, but it 
may be strengthened by the words of the younger 
Pliny, in which he gives a more observant account of 
the characters of the early followers of Christ. 

In the earliest dawn of the second century, only 
some seventy years after the death of Christ, this 
Pliny, who was one of the most accomplished men of 
his age, was a pro-consul in Asia Minor, and so became 
responsible for the execution of certain repressive laws 


* Tacitus, ‘The Annals,’ Book XV., Chap. xlv. 
+ Gibbon, ‘Decline and Fall,’ Vol. II., Chap. xvi. 


266 The Mystery of God. 


issued by Trajan against Christians. In the course of 
his work he was much perplexed by the number and 


harmlessness of these people, and he wrote a letter to — 


the Emperor for advice. This letter (dated Nicomedia 


A.U.C. 856), though often referred to, is seldom read. — 4 


It is well worthy of quotation as a whole, but only 
portions can be given here: 

‘It is, Sire, a rule which I prescribe to myself, to 
consult you upon ali difficult occasions. For who can 
better direct my doubts or instruct my ignorance? I 
have never been present at the resolutions taken con- 
cerning the Christians, therefore I know not for what 
causes or to what degree our complaints may be carried 
om against them. ...... Are those who repent to be 
pardoned? Or is it to no purpose to renounce 


Christianity after having once professed it? Must 


they be punished for the name, although otherwise 
innocent? Or is the name itself so flagitious as to be 
punishable ?’ After describing his previous method of 
investigation, he observes: ‘Soon afterwards the 
crime, as it often happens, by being pursued became 
more diffusive.'. ..°. : 


Describing certain accused persons who recanted, 


he states: 

‘ All these worshipped your image, and the images 
of the gods; and they even vented imprecations against 
Christ: they affirmed that the sum total of their fault 
or of their error consisted in their assembling upon a 
certain stated day before it was light, to sing alter- 
nately among themselves hymns to Christ, as to a god: 
binding themselves by oath not to be guilty of any 
wickedness, not to steal, nor to rob, nor to commit 


The Person of Christ. 267 


adultery, nor to break their faith when plighted, nor to 
deny the deposits in their hands whenever called upon 
to restore them. These ceremonies performed, they 
usually departed, and came together again to take a 
repast, the meat of which was innocent, and eaten pro- 
miscuously: but they had desisted from this custom 
since my edict, wherein, by your commands, I had 
prohibited all public assemblies.’ 3 

Respecting the more staunch professors, he re- 
lates : | 

‘I thought it more necessary to try to gain the truth, 
even by torture, from two women who were said to 
officiate at their worship. But I could discover only 
an obstinate kind of superstition carried to a great ex- 
cess. And therefore, postponing any resolution of my 
own, I have waited the result of your judgment. To 
me an affair of this sort seems worthy of your con- 
sideration, principally from the multitude involved in 
the danger. For many persons of all ages, of all de- 
grees, and of both sexes, are already, and will be con- 
stantly, brought into danger by these accusations. Nor 
is this superstitious contagion confined only to the 
cities; it spreads itself through the villages and the 
country. As yet I think it may be stopped and cor- 
rected. It is very certain that the temples, which were 
almost deserted, now begin to fill again, and the sacred 
rites, which have been a long time neglected, are again 
_ performed. The victims, which hitherto had few pur- 
chasers, are now sold everywhere. From hence we 
may easily infer what numbers of people might be 
reclaimed if there was a proper allowance made for 
repentance.’ 


268 The Mystery of God. 


To this epistle the Emperor replied in a letter which 
has also been preserved, commending the pro-consul’s 
procedure, and assenting to his counsels of modera- 
tion.* | 

Apart from any Christian records, it is therefore 
certain on Jewish and Pagan evidence that Jesus 
Christ lived at the time and place stated in the New 
Testament. It is also certain that about seventy years 
after His death His followers were so numerous 
throughout the cities and country districts of Asia 
Minor that the Pagan temples were almost deserted, 
until persecution began to drive the people back to 
their forsaken devotions. It is also clear from Pliny’s 
letter that Jesus was then worshipped as Divine, that 
His disciples were accustomed to observe a simple meal 
as a religious ordinance, and that they were notable 
for their strict views of truth, chastity, and other moral 
duties. We also know that so far from Pliny’s expec- 
tation that these people could be put down proving 
correct, they continued so to multiply, that two cen- 
turies later the Emperor Constantine saw it expedient 
to profess himself a Christian as a means of attaching 
to himself the strongest party in his empire. 

We have now to examine the testimony of Christian 
writers to their Master. 

Of late years the most strenuous efforts have been 
made to damage the credit of John’s gospel. Fora 
time its composition late in the second century was 
treated as an established fact; but little by little the 
date of its production has been carried back by hard, 
critical warfare, until now not more than twenty years 


_ * Pliny’s ‘Letters,’ Book X., Epistles xcvii. and xcviii. 


The Person of Christ. . 269 


remain in dispute between those who say John wrote 
it at the close of the first century, and those who 
labour to prove its post-apostolic origin. To avoid en- 
cumbering these pages with a long discussion of this 
still debated point, the gospel of John will not be 
quoted or relied upon as evidence. This abstention 
from its use must not be regarded as an admission that 
the genuineness of the gospel is fairly open to question. 
The exclusion, however, of this fourth witness to 
Christ from our discussion will not only avert a lengthy 
review of the argument, but will incidentally disprove 
the often reiterated charge that the Christian Church 
can only vindicate her exalted faith in Jesus as the Son 
of God by appealing to the discourses contained in 
John.* 

With regard to the first three gospels the most 
opposite and contradictory theories have been main- 
tained with dogmatic certainty by adepts in the ‘higher 
criticism.’ Mark is now generally esteemed the earliest, 


* For admirable reviews of the controversy the reader is referred 
to Godet’s ‘Commentary on John’ (Introduction), and to that of 
Canon Westcott. As opinions expressed by men well known for 
their free criticism of Scripture, the following extracts are not with- 
out weight. Matthew Arnold, in his ‘God and the Bible’ (p. 22), 
observes : ‘ Tried fairly, then, and without a preconceived theory 
to warp our criticism, the fourth gospel comes out no fancy piece, 
but a serious and invaluable document, full of incidents given by 
tradition and genuine sayings of our Lord.’ Ewald, in his ‘ History 
of Israel’ (Vol. VI., p. 145, note), observes: ‘ Whoever considers 
that the fourth gospel is a spurious work ascribed to John has not 
learnt to distinguish between original and not original, old and new 
books, and between books written in a simple inartificial style and 
those written artificially in the name of a more famous author or 
holy man. The fourth gospel does not bear a single trace of 
having been written in another’s name.’ 


270 Lhe Mystery of God. 


and his gospel is assigned to a date prior to the de- 
struction of Jerusalem. Luke, mainly because it con- 
tains an explicit reference to the Roman siege, is 


assigned to a rather later date, somewhere about A.D. 80. 
Matthew is thought to have been written earlier than | 


Luke, and probably before a.p. 70. As to the sources 
from whence the Evangelists derived their information, 
criticism is in a similar position to that of the Roman 
Catholic Church when two rival Infallibilities asserted 
their claims to the Papacy. Germans mostly believe 
that all three followed a more ancient written gospel. 
Most English writers affirm a common oral tradition, 
or a triple tradition. The notion that these gospels 
are late compilations, and may have been written in the 
second century, is one which no well-qualified critic, 
however antagonistic to Christianity, now entertains. 
But these three documents which purport to tell the 
life of Christ are not the earliest Christian testimony 
now extant. Some of Paul’s epistles are from fifteen 
to twenty years older than either of them, and the 
genuineness of the most important of his letters has never 
been doubted. The Epistles addressed to the Romans, 
the Galatians, and the Corinthians, are allowed on all 
hands to be the actual writings of the Apostle Paul, and 
to have been composed within a period of some twenty 
to thirty years after the death of Christ. Now, it is 
impossible to read these letters to Gentile and 
European Churches without seeing that they take for 
granted a familiar knowledge of Christ’s life on the 
part of their readers, and of just such a life as Matthew, 
Mark, Luke, and John portray. We know, therefore, 
with historic certainty, that within twenty or thirty 


The Person of Christ. 271 


years of Christ’s death His religion had escaped from 
Jewish trammels, and had so far broken down the wall 
of partition between Jew and Gentile as to form mixed 
communities. Those epistles alone prove that within | 
that short space of time Paul, who was not one of the 
original disciples, had been converted, had flung off his 
Pharisaic prejudices, and had spent a number of years 
in preaching the gospel as summarized by himself in 
1 Corinthians xv. They prove that Paul believed, and 
had convinced many Greeks, that a murdered Jew was 
the Son of God, that He had been raised from the 
grave, and exalted to heaven asa Prince and a Saviour, 
and that He would come once more to judge the world. 
They show that the Lord’s supper was observed pre- 
cisely as it is observed now, viz., as a memorial of 
Christ’s sufferings, as a pledge of fidelity to Him, as a 
bond of love amongst His followers, and as a prophetic 
sign of His return. They show that Christ was be- 
lieved by Paul to have wrought miracles, and also to 
have given a select few, including himself, miraculous 
powers. They showthat the Apostle taught a doctrine 
of the Holy Spirit in full harmony with those discourses 
in John which are most assailed as the invention of a 
later age. Romans viii. and 1 Corinthians xii. contain 
all the most transcendental and so-called mystical 
doctrines of Christ’s spiritual indwelling in His disciples, 
which John reports as having been spoken on the night 
when Jesus was betrayed. Paul, as an independent 
witness, therefore, carries back the most important and, 
to hostile criticism, the most difficult elements of the 
four gospels to a date close up to Christ’s death. 

It is very significant also that Paul had never been 


272 Lhe Mystery of God. 


in Rome when he wrote to the church in that city. dt 
had not been founded by his preaching, and Vet ure 
‘knows that its members have the same faith in Christ 
as the Corinthians. He apologizes for not having 
visited them, long before, and declares that their high 
Christian character was talked of throughout. the 
world. Another significant fact is that already at so 
early a time Paul has occasion to complain that his 
teachings have been misunderstood and _ perverted ; 
that divisions have crept into the Churches; and that 
some members have shown the shallowness of their 
sympathy with Christ by refusing to endure the restraints 
of righteousness. These letters also show that the 
Churches were beset from without by elaborate and 
well-defined objections; and these objections, when 
analyzed, prove to have been directed against those 
lofty claims on behalf of Christ which we are asked to 
believe were the product of a later age. The argument 
of the letter to the Romans proves that the authority 
of Christ to supersede the statute law of Moses had 
been long asserted by Christians, and bitterly re- 
sented by Jews. It shows that Christ’s authority to 
forgive sins and to say, ‘ Thy faith hath saved thee,’ 
was a familiar and fundamental doctrine, and that the 
Jews denounced it as a sign of immorality and lawless- 
ness, just as the Evangelists say their countrymen 
attacked it when Christ was alive. Some of the more 
abstruse chapters are a logical vindication of Christ’s 
authority to take the kingdom from the Jews and give 
it to other nations, as He Himself is described by the 
Evangelists as announcing His intention in various 
parables and discourses. 


The Person of Christ. 27% 


These Pauline epistles show, therefore, that Christ’s 
claim to be the long-expected Messiah and to fulfil the 
ancient Hebrew scriptures was no late invention, but 
an original doctrine on which the gospel was based. 
They carry back all the superhuman claims which the 
Evangelists ascribe to Christ to a time immediately 
following His death. In the superhuman elements of 
these four authors, therefore, we have not to deal with 
myths which took some forty or fifty years to mature. 
They are elements which, whether true or false, are 
traceable to the earliest apostolic preaching. 

We have thus, on independent Jewish, Pagan, and 
Christian authority, found that the main facts of 
Christ’s public ministry as a religious teacher, and His 
crucifixion by Pilate, are solid verities, no more to be 
doubted than the death of Socrates in his Athenian 
prison, or the murder of Cesar in the Roman Senate ; 
and we also know, before approaching the gospel nar- 
ratives, that by some means Christ produced precisely 
such an impression concerning His goodness, wisdom, 
dignity, and Divine Sonship as the Evangelists seek to 
-convey. This conclusion assigns definite limits to the 
questions still to be discussed. Seeing that the main 
outlines of Christ’s life as told by the Evangelists are 
proved to be historic, we have to ask whether the re- 
ported words and works of Christ have also been 
honestly recorded; if not, are the narratives enriched 

with legendary stories of miraculous works. and in- 

vented words; or, as some suppose, are the words 

authentic, while only the miracles have been falsely 

fitted into the true historic outline of His life? Or, 

yet again, were spurious miracles foisted upon the 
18 


274 The Mystery of God. 


credulous Apostles by the wilful imposture of their 
. Master ? 

With regard to most of the alleged words of Christ, 
there is scarcely any dispute. It is confessed by all 
men capable of judging that the sayings of Jesus are 
so unique in their character, that to allege that men like 
the Evangelists invented them, is to affirm a miracle. 
Even Strauss did not impugn the reported sayings of 
Jesus. Some of the discourses in John, and some of 
the prophetic discourses in Luke, are dismissed as in- 
credible, but the genuineness of Christ’s conversations 
is not doubted by anyone whose views deserve atten- 
tion. Every thinker recognises that there must have 
been something in Christ to fire men with enthusiasm, 
to extort homage, and to purify character. Such moral 
and intellectual effects as have notoriously been pro- 
duced do not start into existence uncaused, and those 
who repudiate miracles are compelled to find in the 
sublimity and moral excellence of Christ’s teachings, 
and in the fervour of His love for the poor, and sinful, 
and sick, the necessary element of fact by which to 
account for His influence over men. On this point 
the views of Mill are worthy of notice. ‘ Whatever 
else, he observes, ‘may be taken away from us by 
rational criticism, Christ is still left, a unique figure, 
not more unlike all His precursors than all His followers, 
even those who had the direct benefit of His personal 
teaching. It is of no use to say that Christ, as ex- 
hibited in the gospels, is not historical, and that we 
know not how much of what is admirable has been 
superadded by the tradition of His followers. The 


tradition of followers may have inserted all the miracles 


Se ee ee ee ee ee ee ey 7 ee 


ees ee 


The Person of Chrest. 275 


which He is reputed to have wrought. But who 
among His disciples or among their proselytes was 
capable of inventing the sayings ascribed to Jesus, or 
of imagining the life and character revealed in the 
gospels? Certainly not the fishermen of Galilee; as 
certainly not St. Paul, whose character and idiosyn- 
cracies were of a totally different sort; still less the 
early Christian writers, in whom nothing is more 
evident than that the good that was in them was all 
derived, as they always professed that it was derived, 
from the higher source.’ * 

From such a quarter, this testimony to the inimitable 
quality of Christ’s words is of much value. Whether 
the undoubted words can be separated from the dis- 
puted works of Christ, as Mill too easily assumed, has 
now to be considered. | 

A careful examination of the narratives will discover 
that the alleged miracles are so organically connected 
with the words, that they can no more be removed so as 
to leave a consistent human story, than the veins can 
be taken out of a marble bust without destroying the 
likeness, or than a surgeon can take out a patient’s 
bones, and leave his figure unimpaired. Many of the 
most important sayings and conversations are started 
by, and are concerned about, professed miracles. The 
sudden fame of Christ is unaccountable except through 
the rumours of alleged wonderful works. The commo- 
tion among the populace, the Pharisees, and priests and: 
rulers, was chiefly produced by Christ’s deeds. His 
fame as a healer of disease and restorer of bodily 

* “Essays on Religion,’ p. 453. (The above quotation refers. 
only to the first three gospels.) . 

18—2 


276 The Mystery of God. 


wholeness was more influential with the multitude than 
.any ethical or spiritual tuition. These real or pre- 
tended works of His were clearly the basis of those 
expectations which even the mythical and visionary 
theories of the resurrection are obliged to attribute to 
the disciples before Christ died. Hence Strauss admits 
that immense numbers of miraculous cures must have 
been ascribed to Christ by rumour. Many of these he 
thinks were real cures, although produced by nervous 
excitement. The author of ‘Ecce Homo’ justly said 
in his chapter on ‘Christ’s Credentials’: ‘ Waiving, 
then, for the present the question whether miracles 
were actually wrought, we may state a fact which is 
fully capable of being established by ordinary evidence, 
and which is actually established by evidence as ample 
as any historical fact whatever, the fact, namely, that 
Christ professed to work miracles. We may go farther, 
and assert with confidence that Christ was believed by 
His followers really to work miracles, and that it was 
mainly on this account that they conceded to Him the 
pre-eminent dignity and authority which He claimed.’* 
Elsewhere this author writes more strongly: ‘Nor can 
it be doubted, by the present writer at least, that He 
was believed in His lifetime, and not merely after His 
death, to work miracles. All those circumstances 
which have been represented as suspicious—His un- 
willingness to work miracles in certain cases, the 
contempt He expressed for those whose faith depended 
exclusively upon them—are strong evidence that the 
miracles were, at least, no afterthoughts of the bio- 
graphers, for such circumstances were most unlikely to 
* ‘Ecce Homo,’ p. 43. 


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~~ oo a ~ ots = —! ee ee ee ee ee ee eee ee ee 


_ 


The Person of Christ. 27 7 


occur either in legend or falsification. The fact that 
Christ appeared as a worker of miracles is the best 
attested fact in His whole biography, both by the 
absolute unanimity of all the witnesses, by the con- | 
firmatory circumstances just mentioned, and bycountless 
other special confirmations not likely to be invented, 
striking sayings inseparably connected with them, etc., 
in particular cases.’ * 

Renan, also, furnishes striking testimony to the same 
effect. No man treats the reality of miracles with more 
summary denial than he, yet he confesses that Jesus 
undoubtedly did pretend to work them, and that the 
stories of the synoptic gospels, though incredible now, 
were really believed by the disciples before their Master 
died. Thus the words and works of Christ are in- 
separably bound up together by the admissions of 
men who were most anxious, and intellectually most 
competent, to effect their separation, if it were at all 
possible. 

This conclusion sets before us a most decisive issue. 
When the alleged works of Christ and His admitted 
words are thus proved inseparable, the moral character 
of Christ is staked on the genuineness of the works. 
If He claimed a more than human authority and 
honour on the strength of superhuman powers as 
evinced in miracles, His truthfulness and common 
honesty depend on the reality of those powers. If the 
works were spurious, Jesus was an impostor and a 
blasphemer of God, as His enemies asserted. In that 
case He deserved to die; and of the three malefactors 
who. were crucified together, Jesus would have been 

* “Ecce Homo,’ Preface to Fifth Edition, p. x. 


278 The Mystery of God. 


immeasurably the worst. If, on the contrary, the 
~ works were real, then the claims were well founded, 
and Jesus is rightly honoured by the Christian 
Church. 

To evade this dilemma, it is sometimes asserted that 
the Jesus of Matthew, Mark, and Luke is purely human ; 
and that only the Jesus of John claims to be divine. 

A brief review of the manner in which the claims of 
Christ are reported in the first three gospels will prove 
the fallacy of this idea. 

Mark thus records the impression left upon the 
people by Christ’s earliest teaching in the synagogue at 
Capernaum: ‘They were astonished at His teaching, 
for He taught them as having authority, and not as the 
Scribes’ (Mark 1. 22). In the Sermon on the Mount, 
Christ said: ‘Blessed are the meek’ (Matthew v. 5). 
But what sort of meekness did Jesus Himself possess, 
if only human, while arrogating the right to pronounce 
those beatitudes, and to supersede the teaching of ages, 
including some portions of the Mosaiclaw? Through- 
out the sermon there is a constant use of the pronoun 
‘I.’ The speaker declares His will, and issues His 
requirements with regal majesty, and as a king whose 
dominions are as broad as the moral government of 
God. After upbraiding the cities of Galilee, and de- 
claring that no man knew the Father save the Son, He 
stretched forth His hands, and uttered those words 
which have moved the hearts of all generations: 
‘Come unto Me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, 
and I will give you rest. Take My yoke upon you, and 
learn of Me; for I am meek and lowly in heart: and 
ye shall find rest unto your souls. For My yoke is 


The Person of Christ. 279 


easy, and My burden is light’ (Matthew x1. 28-30). 
Never perhaps was Jesus less meek, if judged by a 
human standard, than when uttering this marvellous 
invitation. 

In His beatitudes He said: ‘ Blessed are they that 
hunger and thirst after righteousness’ (Matthew v. 6). 
He viewed His best hearers as only seekers after 
righteousness, but He never betrayed the least sign 
of unsatisfied desire in Himself. He reproved, and 
sometimes satirized, those who felt no need of repent- 
ance; but He never, by word or sign, confessed the 
consciousness of such a need Himself. He taught men 
to pray for forgiveness, but He never asked to be for- 
given. Even on the cross He said, ‘ Father, forgive 
them,’ not ‘Father, forgive Me.’ Nor was this all. 
He not only refrained from owning any need of 
clemency, but He claimed to exercise the Divine pre- 
rogative of mercy by forgiving sin, and silenced the 
Scribes, who called this assumption blasphemy, by 
commanding a palsied man to arise and walk (Mark u. 
5-12). This same claim pervades all Christ’s dealings 
with notorious sinners as narrated throughout the 
gospels. 

Again, in the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus said:: 
‘Judge not, that ye be not judged’ (Matthew vii. 1); 
yet He habitually did what He forbids men to attempt; 
i.e., He went behind men’s words and actions to deal 
with what He professed to know was in their hearts. 
Many of His conversations owe their entire character 
to this professed power of discerning what no man 
could know. Carrying forward this faculty into the 
future, Jesus presented Himself as the future judge of 


280 Lhe Mystery of God. 


mankind (Matthew vii. 21-23; xxv. 31-46; Mark xiv. 
61, 62; Luke xxii. 69, etc.). , 

In dealing with His disciples, Christ rigorously re- 
pressed all attempts to assert, or even seek, superiority 
over one another (Mark x. 35-45). Yet when He placed 
a little child in their midst as a pattern of true greatness, 
He made it a pattern of childlike trust in Himself, and 
said, ‘ Whoso shall receive one such little child in My 
name receiveth Me: but whoso shall cause one of these 
little ones that believe on Me tostumble, it is profitable 
for him that a great millstone should be hanged about 
his neck, and that he should be sunk in the depth of the 
sea’ (Matthew xviil. 5, 6). He forbade His disciples to 
be called masters, remarking that, ‘ Whosoever shall 
exalt himself shall be humbled,’ yet in the same breath 
declared, ‘One is your Master, even the Christ’ 
(Matthew xxili. 10-12). He claimed for Himself that 
He was ‘ Lord of the Sabbath’ (Mark ii. 28; Luke vi. 
5): and that He was ‘greater than the temple,’ which, 
according to the Old Testament scriptures, was God’s 
peculiar dwelling, and the appointed meeting-place 3 
between man and God (Matthew xii. 6). He exacted 
the most unreserved obedience to Himself, the most 
absolute devotion to His personal service, and the 
most implicit faith in His word. He treated loyalty 
to Himself as the evidence of a right state of heart 
towards God, and assumed the right to promise 
eternal life and honour to all who should suffer per- 
secution for His sake (Matthew v. 11; Luke xviil. 
28-30, etc.). On one occasion a man came saying, 
‘Good Master, what shall I do that I may inherit 
eternal life?’ and Jesus, to test his thought, said, ‘ Why 


The Person of Chrost. 281 


callest thou Me good? None is good save one, even God.’ 
This reply is sometimes quoted as a modest disclaimer 
of goodness, or of more than human dignity; but read- 
ing on, it becomes clear that Christ not only accepted 
the word ‘good,’ but expressly and emphatically 
accepted it as the earthly representative of God. 
Leaving out the great command to love God with all 
the heart and soul, He recited the moral precepts of 
the law; and when the man replied, ‘ Master, all these 
have I observed from my youth,’ Jesus answered: ‘ One 
thing thou lackest: go, sell whatsoever thou hast, and 
give to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in heaven: 
and come, follow Me’ (Mark x. 17-22). Thus Christ 
deliberately substituted loving consecration to Himself 
for the first law of Sinai, ‘Thou shalt love the Lord thy 
God.’ What pretensions to Divinity can be quoted 
from John more unmistakable than this? Or, on the 
supposition that Jesus was a mere man, what could be 
more blasphemously presumptuous than this claim which 
Mark preserves ? 

If we were to quote all that can be found in the three 
first Gospels savouring of superhuman self-assertion on 
Christ’s part, we should have to quote them almost 
bodily. Whenever He speaks, He speaks as one 
above His hearers. If, therefore, we read the Gospel 
story without detecting these assumptions, it can only 
be because they so marvellously accord with the per- 
sonal dignity of the Jesus the evangelists depict, that 
we unconsciously and without offence accept from Him 
words which, coming from any other lips, would 
arouse the most intense indignation. The fact that so 
many can read these narratives without noticing the 


282 The Mystery of God. 


extraordinary assumptions which pervade the words and 
* deeds of Christ is a singular testimony to the perfect 
symmetry of the portrait. It shows that character, 
speech, and actions are all upon the same grand scale, 
harmonizing and blending with each other in faultless 
proportion and truth. The reported deeds of Christ 
would be glaring monstrosities but for the quiet sub- 
limity of His speech and the matchless beauty. of His 
spirit. The words of Christ would jar upon our ears 
as the strains of unparalleled arrogance, but for their 
accompaniments of wondrous works and the irresistible 
attraction of a meekness which is not falsified to our 
hearts by the most exalted tones of authority. 

But while the superhuman claims of Christ are often 
overlooked, they cannot be denied when distinctly 
pointed out. How, then, are they to be disposed of ? 
How is the difficulty they create dealt with by those 
who recognise them, yet refuse to regard them as well- 
founded ? 

Strauss laboured hard to tone down the facts, but 
substantially he confessed the difficulty, and tried to 
evade it by ascribing to Jesus an enthusiastic state of 
self-deception. According to him, Jesus set Himself 
to carry out the Messianic programme found in the 
prophets, and meeting with singular success at the 
outset, came at length to believe Himself the Messiah ; 
and so He and His disciples, and the populace, were all 
~ carried away by an enthusiastic credulity to believe that 
all their Messianic expectations were being fulfilled. 
When Strauss came to apply this theory to the details, 
it landed him in endless absurdities. Asan explanation 
of Christ’s life, it is dead. Of such an enthusiasm, there 


The Person of Chrost. 283 


are no traces. There never was narrated the life of a 
calmer, more self-possessed being than Jesus. When 
His disciples betray undue elation, He invariably re- 
presses it. When enthusiastic volunteers present them- 
selves, He bids them wait and count the cost. When 
crowds become excited in His favour, He retreats to the 
wilderness, or scatters them by hard sayings. His whole 
public life was maintained in the face of scathing criti- 
cism, and under the fierce light of a watchfulness which 
never lost an opportunity of obstructing His plans, or 
of insulting His person, and ridiculing His pretensions. 
His last days witnessed His most exalted claims and 
sublimest confidence, together with shaken hearts and 
doubtful minds in His disciples, and intensified scorn 
and hatred in His enemies. From His baptism to His 
death no trace of excitement, or fanaticism, or un- 
reasoning fervour can be discovered. . The picture is 
uniformly one of the Man who never suffered a moment’s 
illusion as to the true feelings and thoughts, whether of 
friends or foes, or as to the certain issue of His own 
Career. 

But this is not the chief part of the answer. Even 
if the facts were not so utterly against it, Strauss’s 
theory fails as an apology for Christ’s moral character. 
Enthusiasm may explain a delirious self-conceit in its 
later stages; but no man, unless a lunatic, ever came 
to believe himself superhuman, except as the sequel to 
a course of conscious self-flattery, and a despicable 
acceptance of fulsome praise from those he stooped to 
court. If a man is given up to believe such a lie about 
himself, it can only be asa moral retribution for having, 
first of all, deceived others. Renan, in his ‘Life of Jesus,’ 


284 Lhe Mystery of God. 


clearly recognises this position. He borrows the idea 
of enthusiastic self-deception, but he does not pretend 
for a moment that this alters the moral conditions. 
He takes the view of a ‘ Parisian man-of-the-world,’ 
whose conscience is as volatile as his imagination. He 
admits that Christ laid claim to miraculous powers 
and superhuman authority, but without a blush ap- 
plauds the boldness and genius of Christ’s successful 
imposture, as a mark of superiority to all the pitiful 
scruples of feebler men, and elaborately traces the 
process by which imposture develops into self-deceit. 
These are his words: ‘An absolute conviction, or 
rather the enthusiasm, which freed Him from even the 
possibility of doubt, shrouded all these boldnesses. 
We little understand, with our cold and scrupulous 
natures, how anyone can be so entirely possessed by the 
idea of which He has made Himself the apostle. To 
the deeply earnest races of the West, conviction means 
sincerity to one’s self. But sincerity to one’s self has not 
much meaning to Oriental peoples, little accustomed 
to the subtleties of a critical spirit. Honesty and 
imposture are words which, in our rigid consciences, 
are opposed as two irreconcilable terms. In the East 
they are connected by numberless subtle links and 
windings . . .. The literal truth has little value to the 
Oriental; he sees everything through the medium of his 
ideas, his interests, and his passions. History is im- 
possible, if we do not fully admit that there are many 
standards of sincerity. All great things are done 
through the people; now we can only lead the people 
by adapting ourselves to its ideas. The philosopher 
who, knowing this, isolates and fortifies himself in his 


The Person of Christ. 285 


integrity, is highly praiseworthy. But he who takes 
humanity with its illusions, and seeks to act with it 
and upon it, cannot be blamed. . . ._ It is easy for us, 
who are so powerless, to call this falsehood, and, proud 
of our timid honesty, to treat with contempt the heroes 
who have accepted the battle of life under other con- 
ditions. When we have effected by our scruples what 
they accomplished by their falsehoods, we shall have 
the right to be severe upon them. At least, we must 
make a marked distinction between societies like our 
own, where everything takes place in the light of re- 
flection, and simple and credulous communities, in 
which the beliefs that have governed ages have been 
born. Nothing great has been established which does 
not rest ona legend. The only culprit in such cases is 
the humanity which is willing to be deceived.’* 

Of all the insults ever heaped on the head of Jesus, 
this passage is one of the most atrocious. Such im- 
moral praises constitute a crown of thorns sharper 
than those woven by the Roman soldiers. They are 
more disgraceful than any spitting, and a robe of 
honour more full of mockery than the purple imitation 
of Cesar’s. But the insult is not limited to Christ. 
It is cast on all readers of Renan’s book, because we 
are invited to worship a deceiver, not merely in spite 
of, but because of his deceit. In other parts of his 
book Renan speaks of Jesus as the Man in whom ‘ was 
condensed all that is good and elevated in our nature.’ 
‘Let us,’ he exclaims, ‘ place then the pérson of Jesus 
at the highest summit of human greatness’ (p. 305), and 
putting on his mantle of prophecy, he closes his fifth 

* ‘Life of Jesus,’ p. 186. 


286 The Mystery of God. 


gospel by saying, ‘Whatever may be the unexpected 

phenomena of the future, Jesus will not be surpassed. 
His worship will constantly renew its youth, the tale of 
His life will cause ceaseless tears, His sufferings will 
soften the best hearts: all the ages will proclaim that 
among the sons of men there is none born who is 


greater than Jesus.’ But every uncorrupted mind will _ 


affirm that, if Jesus was such a ‘Jesuit’ as Renan 
depicts, there have been many greater than He. 
Millions of His disciples have been inspired, by what 
they believed His spirit, to accept obscurity, odium, or 
death, rather than pander to the populace, or to kings, 
or priests, for the sake of influence, power, or place. 
Jesus would have been a greater man had He never 
left the bench in Nazareth, but had gone down to the 
grave a truthful carpenter, than if He had really 
emerged from that low estate to climb the world’s 
loftiest pedestal by guile. Happily the general con- 
science of mankind has not sunk so low as Renan 
seems to imagine. If mankind should ever be per- 
suaded that Jesus did not fulfil at least this part of the 
ancient Messianic ideal, ‘He did no violence, neither 
was any deceit in His mouth,’ the last chapter of 
Christian history will be swiftly closed, and some 
mournful hand will write at the foot of each evangel, 
‘The praises of Jesus, the son of David, are ended.’ 
From the immoral eulogy of alleged immorality it is 
positively refreshing to pass to Mr. Francis Newman’s 
treatment of the difficulty. Having rejected Christ's 
claim to superhuman dignity and authority, and being 
reluctantly brought to admit with Renan that these 
pretensions were really made by Jesus, Mr. Newman 


The Person of Christ. 287 


had the courage to denounce these pretensions as 
Wamorals The chapter in his.‘ Phases of. Faith, 
entitled the ‘ Moral Perfection of Jesus,’ has been called 
‘the very floor of Pandemonium,’ because some Chris- 
tians have felt that no lower depth could be sounded. 
According to a truer judgment, it is out of all com- 
parison less obnoxious than the passage quoted from 
Renan. It does homage to eternal principles of 
righteousness, and at least spares Christ the indignity 
of being magnified as a brilliant sinner. It has also 
the merit of complying with Christ’s challenge to His 
accusers in His earthly lifetime: ‘ Either make the tree 
good and the fruit good, or make the tree corrupt*and 
its fruit corrupt, for the tree is known by its fruit.’ 

To form a just estimate of the painful chapter under 
notice, it must be remembered that Mr. Newman wrote 
it in compliance with repeated demands. He wrote it 
most reluctantly, and called it an ‘odious task.’ His 
friend, Dr. James Martineau, in particular challenged 
him to show his data for holding, against the almost 
universal judgment of good men, the moral imperfection 
of Jesus. Dr. Martineau, like many Unitarians of the 
past or expiring generation, intensely reveres Christ as 
a faultless person, while regarding Him as hable to 
error, and discrediting the gospel of John. But Mr. 
Francis Newman, like Miss Martineau, saw clearly that 
this position was untenable, and having renounced faith 
in Christ’s Divinity, was prepared to give his reasons 
for passing by the Unitarian camp. Before beginning 
his task, he explains that no so-called ‘ orthodox’ 
Christian need feel shocked at his charges, because the 
defects to be cited are only defects on the supposition 


288 The Mystery of God. 


that Jesus was human. ‘In fact,’ he observes, ‘ the 
same action or word in Jesus may be consistent or 
inconsistent with moral perfection, according to the 
previous assumptions concerning His person.* Work- 
ing on this well-defined foundation, he proceeds to 
demonstrate from the synoptic gospels that Jesus 
claimed to exercise superhuman authority, and both 
demanded and received such honours, and obedience, 
and devotion as are due only to the Divine Being. 
Having displayed at length what he esteems the false 
and arrogant assumptions of Jesus, he states as his 
conclusion, ‘that in consistency of goodness, Jesus fell 
far below vast numbers of His unhonoured disciples.’ 
Granting that Jesus was only a man, there can be no 
escape from this conclusion. The only logical or moral 
objection which can then be urged against it, is that it 
is far too feeble a verdict to follow so heavy an indict- 
ment. If Christ’s assumptions were false, He was an 
utterly bad man, and His severest condemnation would 
be found in the purity of the moral sentiments He 
preached to others, but systematically violated in His 
own career. Unless His claims were valid His con- 
demnation was just, and His judges, instead of being 
execrated by mankind, are blameless. 

The dilemma to which we are thus reduced is one 
which multitudes shrink from deciding. With an intel- 
lectual prepossession against the admission of miracles 
or the recognition of a superhuman visitant to our 
earth, they have also an unalterable sympathy with the 
centurion who exclaimed, ‘ Surely this was a righteous 
man.’ It is apparent on every page that Mr. Newman's 

* ‘Phases of Faith,’ p. 141. 


The Person of Christ. 289 


own heart was wrung by this inward conflict. His 
mild conclusion that Jesus fell below many of His dis- 
ciples in ‘consistency of goodness,’ may have been 
moderated in part by an honourable regard for the feel- 
ings of Christians; but in writing it he was also 
evidently restrained by an uneasy feeling akin to Pilate’s, 
when called upon to judge a man whose presence smote 
him with a mystic awe. There is nothing rare in this 
reluctant reverence for Christ. Since the armed men 
fell back at His glance, in the garden of Gethsemane, 
it has been a common thing for opponents to quail 
under the spell of His unrivalled beauty and holiness. 
In spite of all the difficulties of reconciling the good- 
ness of Jesus with any humanitarian theory of His 
person, multitudes who will not worship Him as Lord 
bow down before Him as the ‘ fairest of the sons of 
men. It is inconsistent; it is absurd; but it is irre- 
sistible, for the heart of man will not listen to any cold 
pleadings of the intellect, and rises up against all accu- 
sations to confirm the verdict of his Roman judge: ‘I 
find in Him no fault at all.’ 

In studying the Messianic prophecy contained in 
Isaiah liii., it was shown that there are only two ways 
of resisting the conclusion that in that chapter we have 
a verified oracle of God. It must either be shown that 
the Gospel narratives are not true, or that Jesus im- 
personated the character of the expected Messiah with 
an actor’s skill. We are now in a position to say 
that the first of these two methods is a failure. It 
has been ascertained that the gospels contain a true 
account of the career of Jesus Christ, and that they 
set before us with unrivalled vigour and beauty a life- 


1g 


290 The Mystery of God. 


like picture of Him as He appeared to His enemies 
and friends. Unless, therefore, we are prepared to 


say with Renan and Newman that Christ was a de-- 


ceiver of the people, we must allow that almost 
all the special features of the prophetic portrait were 
marvellously fulfilled in His person. The absolute 
sinlessness of Christ as a spiritual fact could only be 
demonstrated evidently by One who was acquainted 
with all the secrets of His heart from birth to death. 
But He certainly betrayed no consciousness of sin, 
and no fault has ever been found in Him which in the 


faintest degree militates against His claims, because it » . 


is only the making of these superhuman claims which 
is alleged against Him. Millions have felt that the 
character of Christ is the one pure and perfect thing 
in human story, and those who have imitated Him 
most assiduously have proved themselves to be the salt 
and light of the earth. The purer His disciples become, 
the more beauty they see in Him; the more self- 
denying they become, the more they admire that pro- 
longed sacrifice which was consumed as by fire upon 
the cross. If men do not discern the beauty of Christ, 
and if, being once assured that the gospels are true, 
they are not inwardly convinced that in Jesus of 
Nazareth there was no guile, they are to be compas- 
sionated, but are no more to be reasoned with than are 
men who lift up eyeless sockets towards the sun and 
say, ‘ We see no light.’ 

Granting the guilelessness of Christ, there are only 
two of the nine special features of the Messianic 
picture previously enumerated (p. 236) which need 
further remark. The renewed life of Jesus is-reserved 


The Person of Christ. 291 


for consideration in the following chapter, and His 
intercessory work must await the provings of another 
state of existence. If Christ has prolonged His days, 
and is still pleading for transgressors as He prayed for © 
them with His dying breath, that work is carried on 
beyond the reach of human knowledge. Some things, 
however, are indisputably certain. Within a few weeks 
of His death Christ was declared to be alive again, 
and He has since been believed in by an increasing 
multitude as ‘alive for evermore.’ The thought of 
Christ continuing in heaven that work of the Lord 
which death seemed to close so disastrously has been 
the strength and stay of innumerable hosts. Viewed 
in relation to ancient prophecy, these earthly results 
which have followed Christ’s career are more marvel- 
lous and perplexing on the supposition that He did not 
rise from the dead than the occurrence of His resur- 
rection would be as a central fact in the midst of such 
mysterious phenomena. Around the grave of Christ 
the most wonderful events of time are clustered; and 
our final task must be to ask whether the unique and 
radiant Being whose body was laid in that unsullied 
tomb was really holden of death, or whether, in this 
Son of Man, man’s last enemy was overcome. 


19—-2 


CHAPTER Is. 
THE RESURRECTION OF CHRIST. 


Tue first attempt to account for the alleged Resurrec- 
tion of Christ, without admitting a miracle, was made 
by Celsus, an Epicurean philosopher, who wrote in the 
latter half of the second century. His theory was that 
Jesus did not really die, but was laid in the grave in a 
state of suspended animation. Logically, therefore, as 
well as historically, this contention demands our earliest 
consideration, because, unless there was a true death, 
there can be no need to discuss those theories which 
concede the decease but deny the revival of Jesus. 

The most obvious objection to this notion is that it is 
a pure fabrication, all the evidence upon the subject 
which remains—Jewish, Pagan, and Christian—being 
distinctly to the effect that Jesus was effectually put to 
death. Roman executioners were well able to do their 
work, and Jewish eyes would scarcely fail to see that it 
was done. The few modern writers who support the 
theory of Celsus, feebly urge that crucifixion was a slow 
death, and cite vague rumours of wonderful recoveries 
from the effects of long suspension. Josephus states 
that he saw several men on crosses when Titus was 
encamped against Jerusalem, and that he begged for 
three of them to be taken down and spared. Titus 


The Resurrection of Christ. 293 


consented, and one of the trio was restored by medical 
treatment. Hence it is suggested that one of three 
may have survived on a more memorable occasion. 
The story is by no means above suspicion; but the 
inference to which it points is most unfavourable to 
the notion it is quoted to sustain. It will be noticed 
that, according to Josephus, the three men were taken 
down while confessedly alive, and with enough vitality 
to give him some hope that all might recover. Yet 
only one recovered, and that after great care and medical 
attention. But Jesus was officially declared dead when 
removed from the cross. What then, by comparison, 
was His chance of recovery? Again, one witness of 

the resurrection says that Jesus was pierced after death | 
with a spear by a Roman soldier, and that ‘ straightway 
there came out blood and water’ (John xix. 34).* This 
is ridiculed by Strauss and others, because they say 
blood and water could not, under any circumstances, 
have gushed out together. It is no doubt true that, in 
ordinary cases, no blood would flow from a wound made 
after the circulation had been stopped ; and it is also true 
that only blood, and not blood and water, would gush 
out from a wound inflicted while the circulation con- 
tinued. No satisfactory explanation of the phenomenon 
recorded by John appears to have been published until 
averyrecent date. In 1805 Dr. Gruner propounded the 
theory that Jesus was not quite dead until the spear- 


* IT quote here from John because his witness in this sentence is 
held to be specially damaging to the case he would establish. If, 
while removing the objection founded upon it, some incidental 
strength is added to the witness of the other evangelists, it will not 
be a departure from the intimation given on p. 269, because the death 
of Christ is otherwise amply attested. ; 


294 nD he Mystery of God. 


wound was inflicted; but this failed to satisfy scientific 
_ critics. In 1847 Dr. Stroud issued his work entitled 
‘A Physical Treatise on the Cause of the Death of 
Christ,’ in which he demonstrated that when death has 
been caused by a rupture of the heart, a post-mortem 
wound which pierces the pericardium will occasion a 
considerable flow of water. His theory, though for 
some years widely accepted, failed to account for the 
flow of blood, and has latterly been rejected by many 
eminent Christian writers on the subject. But quite 
recently the Rev. S. Haughton, M.D., has published 
the results of very careful investigations, in which he 
supplies all that was lacking in the theory of Dr. Stroud. 
He shows conclusively that crucifixion so affects the 
action of the intercostal muscles as to induce in all 
cases an abnormal lodgment of imperfectly oxidated 
blood in the lungs; and hence that if the lungs of any 
crucified person were pierced after death, there would 
be a flow of dark fluid blood from the wound. If, 
therefore, as there is every reason to believe, Christ’s 
death was immediately occasioned by a rupture of the 
substance of the heart after suffering a few hours on 
the cross, all the conditions must have been present 
which are needed to account for the phenomenon re- 
corded; and a spear penetrating through the lungs 
to the heart would produce first blood and then 
water exactly as John asserts that he beheld at Cal- 
vary.* Itis evident, on the face of John’s narrative, 
that he was quite aware that the phenomenon of blood 
and water issuing from a dead body was mysterious. 
He attests the fact, however, in the most deliberate and 


* See the Church Quarterly Review, January, 1880. , 


The Resurrection of Christ. 295 


solemn manner, without any attempt to explain it. 
The elucidation of this singular physical phenomenon 
has, however, come at last, and incidentally removes 
another difficulty from the history. It was always 
regarded as strange that Christ’s death should have | 
occurred in so unusually short a time; but a ruptured 
heart is the most probable cause of death that can be 
suggested in view of His intense spiritual anguish, added 
to His physical injuries; and on the supposition that 
this really was the case, the brevity of His sufferings, 
and the unprecedented effect of the post-mortem wound, 
are not only explained, but their conjunction in a nar- 
rative told by a man who knew nothing of their scientific 
significance is one of those inimitable marks of true 
description which put hostile criticism to shame. 

There is, however, no need to put stress upon this 
point. If Jesus did not die while still hanging on the 
cross, it would have to be explained how He survived 
the wrapping in linen and the entombment. If, con- 
trary to nature, He survived these experiences, we must 
be informed how He escaped from the sepulchre. The 
gardener, says one author, must have wanted to move 
the stone for some purpose, and so liberated Jesus un- 
wittingly ! But supposing there were no Roman soldiers 
on guard, and that Jesus was so fortunate as to survive 
execution and burial, and to be thus released, other 
difficulties would remain for explanation. 

If the reappearances of Jesus were those of a man 
recovered from His wounds, some persons must have 
supplied Him with raiment, for He did not go about 
in grave-clothes, and most assuredly those He had worn 
before the execution were not buried by His side. If, 


296 The Mystery of God. 


after such fearful sufferings, He could dispense with 
medical care, He certainly must have needed food and 
some secure hiding-place ; and these not only for the 
first few days, but for as long as He continued alive. 
Modern advocates of this theory scorn to deal with 
such troublesome matters as these, but they expect us 
to regard it as an explanation of all the narratives of 
reappearance in the gospels, and so of the disciples’ 
faith in Christ’s real resurrection from the dead; nor 
do they esteem it incompatible with some faith in Him 
on our part still. If the Christian Church, however, 
were to found her preaching of Christ on such a theory, 
the world would speedily denounce the tale as incon- 
sistent with the meanest views of Christ’s morality. 
Enthusiasm cannot account for such a ghastly series 
of deceptions practised by Him on confiding friends 
as this implies. It represents Jesus as concealing 
Himself by the aid of some unknown accomplices, 
while His chief disciples proclaim that He has as- 
cended to the throne of heaven; and it leaves us to 
imagine Him either committing suicide in a bath of 
burning acid, like the veiled prophet sung of by Thomas 
Moore, or else as dragging out a miserable existence in 
obscurity, while a false gospel was spreading abroad. 
We are required to believe, moreover, that all this was 
done in the name of God, righteousness and truth, and 
with a most sanctifying effect upon the world! 

The mythical theory, which admits the death of 
Jesus and assumes that belief in His appearances after 
death was slowly developed in the course of many 
years, may safely be passed over. Evidence has been 
advanced to show that a risen and ascended Christ 


The Resurrection of Christ. 207 


was preached, believed in, and widely worshipped in 
the world immediately after He disappeared from 
human sight, and need not be repeated here. The 
only theories which remain for consideration and — 
choice are two; viz., the visionary theory, and the 
faith of the Christian Church that Jesus was raised 
from the dead by the power of God. 

In his second ‘Life of Jesus,’ Strauss, receding from 
his original mythical theory, virtually adopted that 
which treats the appearances of the risen Christ as 
purely subjective phenomena, produced by the intense 
love and earnest expectations and desires of the dis- 
ciples. He made, however, no serious attempt to show 
how such visions could be explained, or to exhibit their 
relation to admitted facts. Baur, allowing the phe- 
nomena to be indisputable, renounced all hope of ex- 
plaining them. Keim, the greatest German critic of 
the negative school, also concedes the phenomena in 
question, and scathingly exposes the failure of his pre- 
decessors to account for them, but leaves the task un- 
tried. Where he feared to tread it will require a hardy 
spirit to make a new adventure. It is easy to wrap the 
story in a cloud of vague language, and to assume all 
that most requires to be proved. A little literary art 
and a tone of confident superiority to such prosaic 
matters as historic detail may carry an author plea- 
santly over the rocks of physical impossibility, and 
over logical gulfs and seas of absurdity, without the 
miraculous nature of his flight being observed by 
generous readers. But before the visionary theory 
can be reasonably accepted, some advocate must in- 
struct us how such visions as are related in the New 


oe 


298 | The Mystery of God. 


Testament could conceivably have happened to such 
men as the disciples; and how the various moral, 
mental, and physical difficulties which beset the hypo- 
thesis can be disposed of. — 

The only notable endeavour to achieve this task is 
that which has made the name of Renan famous. 
This writer is undoubtedly a man of great learning 
and genius, and his works have been read wherever 
Christian literature is known. It is incumbent upon 
us, therefore, to submit his labours to a fair examina- 
tion. Renan depicts the disciples as without any 
definite hope in their first sorrow of bereavement. 
The words of their Master about His death and its 
sequel were not yet understood, as they were after- 
wards led to interpret them by real or imaginary 
events. But even on the first day Renan thinks they 
did not renounce all hope, and he invents a plausible 
train of thought which may have filled those Sabbath 
hours, and quickly urged them to exclaim, ‘He must 
be living!’ On that day, he says, ‘they resuscitated 
Jesus in their hearts by the intense love which they 
bore Him. They decided that Jesus had not died. 
. .. Only let a material fact, insignificant of itself, 
allow the persuasion that His body is no longer here 
below, and the dogma of the resurrection will be estab- 
lished for ever.’* It will be observed that the depend- 
ence of visions on physical facts of some kind is here 
confessed. They may have no physical cause, but they 
must have suitable physical occasions and conditions. 
Accepting the priority of Mary Magdalene as authentic, 
Renan follows her to the grave and assigns to her the 

* ‘The Apostles,’ p. 45. 


The Resurrection of Christ. 299 


glory of accomplishing the resurrection. ‘She bore on 
that day during one hour all the work of the Christian 
conscience; her witness decided the faith of the future.’ 
When she arrived at the sepulchre the stone was not 
in its place: ‘the vault was open. The body was no 
longer there.’ With surprise and grief she runs to the 
disciples. Peter and John come as narrated, see the 
open grave, the linen cloths, and the head-napkin, and 
return overwhelmed with grief. 

Up to this point we are not introduced to anything 
visionary. The changed position of the stone, and the 
emptiness of the grave are physical realities, without 
which the subsequent mental processes could not be 
started. The reader will therefore bear in mind that 
these vulgar materialistic features of the history will 
require elucidation. Beholding the strange spectacle 
thus presented, Mary lingers. ‘Suddenly she hears a 
light rustling behind her. There is a man standing. 
At first she thinks it is the gardener,’ and of him she 
makes inquiry for the body. ‘For the only answer, 
she hears herself called by her name, ‘‘ Mary!” It was 
the voice that had so often thrilled her before. It was 
the accent of Jesus. ‘‘O my Master!” she cries. She 
is about to touch Him. ... The light vision draws 
back, and says to her, “Touch me not.” Little .by 
little the shadow disappears. But the miracle of love 
is accomplished. That which Cephas could not do, 
Mary has done; she has been able to draw life, sweet 
and penetrating words, from the empty tomb.... 
The resurrection has its first direct witness.’ All the 
subsequent visions are represented as the development 
of this germ of faith in a phantom of Mary’s brain. 


300 The Mystery of God. 


‘The glory of the resurrection belongs, then, to Mary 
Magdalene. After Jesus, it is Mary who has done 
most for the foundation of Christianity. The shadow 
created by the delicate sensibility of Magdalene hovers 
still over the world. Queen and patroness of idealists, 
Magdalene knew better than anyone how to affirm her 
dream, and impose on everyone the holy vision of her 
passionate soul. Her great womanly affirmation, ‘‘ He 
has arisen,” has been the basis of the faith of 
humanity.’ 

Shall we now proceed to criticize this piece of work ? 
Shall we ask how the grave became empty, and how 
the cloths were folded so as to make room for this 
bright, sunny morning madness? This is the keystone 
of the visionary arch which bridges the chasm between 
the historic death of Jesus and the equally historic 
faith in His risen life which speedily spread over Asia 
and Europe. No one could suggest a more plausible 
beginning for a series of visions than this, or a more 
likely person to start them than Mary. But will it 
bear examination? Renan thinks not, for he imme- 
diately deprecates criticism by bursting into a sort of 
hysterical denunciation of what he certainly has much 
causeto dread. ‘ Away, impotent reason!’ he exclaims. 
‘Apply no cold analysis to this chef-d’euvre of idealism 
and of love. If wisdom refuses to console this poor 
human race, betrayed by fate, let folly attempt the 
enterprise. Where is the sage who has given to the 
world so much joy as the possessed Mary Magdalene?” 
It is thought in some quarters that Christian faith is 
accustomed to cry ‘away’ to ‘reason’ and to deprecate 
‘cold analysis,’ but here we see that ‘ Rational Criti- 


The Resurrection of Christ. 301 


cism’ has its realm of faith, and is not ashamed to 
supplicate for such forbearance as it does not always 
grant. 

Postponing our scrutiny of this ‘chef-deuvre of 
idealism,’ we may pass on to the evening when two 
disciples set out on their journey toEmmaus. Inspite 
of the significant physical fact of an open grave, and 
of all that the woman had said, Cleopas and his com- 
panion were ‘fullof sadness.’ On the roadan unknown 
companion joined them. This mysterious being was 
brought by fate upon the scene most opportunely, for 
he knew how to quote the Scriptures, and suggest hopes 
of Christ’s revival to his disconsolate companions. 
During the meal at Emmaus we are told that the two 
disciples gave way to a sort of ‘pleasurable sadness.’ 
Forgetting the stranger, who had become their guest, 
they seem to see Jesus ‘holding the bread, and then 
breaking it and offering it to them.’ During their 
reverie—a reverie in which both were sunk as with one 
mind—the stranger, either too kind to disturb their 
delicious dream, or too offended at their absent- 
mindedness to say ‘ Farewell,’ slipped out unnoticed, 
to continue his journey, and so, on waking up, they 
agree that it must have been Jesus! 

Returning to Jerusalem, these delighted visionaries 
learned that Jesus had also shown Himself to Peter; 
and then came the crowning wonder. ‘At these 
decisive periods of time,’ writes Renan, ‘a current of 
air, a creaking window, or a chance murmur, are suffi- 
cient to fix the belief of people for ages.’ ‘During a 
moment of silence a slight breath passed over the face 
of the assembly.’ This was enough. Some declared 


302 Lhe Mystery of God. 


they heard a voice saying ‘Peace.’ The rest soon 
fancied the same, and all agreed that Jesus must be 
present. Some said they saw marks of the nails and 
the spear. ‘Such were the incidents of the day which 
has decided the lot of the human race. The opinion 
that Jesus had arisen was thus irrevocably propounded. 
The sect that was thought to have been extinguished 
by the death of the Master, was, from henceforth, 
assured of a wondrous future. How Thomas was 
satisfied we are not told, but are assured that a week 
later he was convinced. Then we are led with much 
poetic description to Galilee, where the disciples were — 
haunted by renewed visions, Peter one day thought 
that he heard Jesus ask him thrice, ‘ Lovest thou Me a 
and he ‘imagined that he replied, Oh, yea, Lord!’ and 
that twice the apparition said ‘Feed My sheep.’ This 
dream he told to John. ‘One day, when following 
their spiritual chiefs, the large band of faithful Galileans’ 
climbed a familiar mountain, and the whole assembly 
(500 Paul says) ‘imagined that they saw the Divine 
spectre displayed in the clouds,’ and all worshipped. 
Renan, who has been there, declares that these Galilean 
mountains inspire ‘the idea of the immensity of the 
world and the desire of conquering it.’ Thus the 
disciples on this occasion were so elated with mountain 
air, that they thought Jesus inspired them to go and 
overcome all nations in His name. This was the great 
commission! While these apparitions were frequent, 
the disciples said Jesus tarried on the earth; as they 
became rare, they began to say, ‘ He is ascended into 
heaven,’ and this idea induced at length a vision, or a 
legend of a vision, of the ascension from the Mount of 


The Resurrection of Christ. 303 


Olives. Shortly afterwards a thunder-storm arose, and 
was mistaken by the disciples for the gift of the Holy 
Spirit. 

Such is Renan’s much lauded synthesis of the origin 
of Christianity. Itisindeed a ‘ chef d’ceuvre of idealism.’ 
If Christian faith had been based on such romantic 
inventions as these of the ‘ fifth gospel,’ how eagerly 
would the critical eagles have gathered together, and 
what a feast they would have found! 

The first question demanding our attention is this: 
How are the physical facts which underlie this visionary 
structure to be accounted for? The grave was opened 
and the body was gone before Mary’s imagination was 
inflamed. How came these things to pass? Kenan, 
having filled the air with spiritual pageantry, naively 
remarks: ‘Scarcely have we thought, heretofore, to 
propose a trifling question, but one which admits not 
of easy solution. Whilst Jesus rose again in this real 
manner, that is to say, in the hearts of those who loved 
Him ; while the immovable conviction of the Apostles 
was being formed and the faith of the world being pre- 
pared—in what place did the worms consume the 
lifeless corpse which, on the Saturday evening, had 
been deposited in the sepulchre ?’ (p. 66). He mentions 
several hypotheses, but only to dismiss them as incredi- 
ble; and, finally, sees in the linen cloths, and in the 
napkin carefully folded in a corner, the marks of a 
woman’s fingers, and so ascribes the disposal of the 
body to Mary Magdalene. His touching picture of 
Mary Magdalene musing in sorrow by the empty grave 
seems to have been already forgotten, when this after- 
thought arose. When Renan wrote that pathetic 


304 The Mystery of God. 


passage he could not possibly have been thinking that 
“Mary had first of all stolen the body and folded the 
clothes with artful tact. A body-snatcher would be 
the last of all persons to have a vision, unless of a 
terrifying and remorseful character. Nevertheless, to 
this supposition Renan is driven, at length, as the least 
improbable which his fertile brain can invent. He re- 
minds us that Mary had been, according to the parlance 
of the age, ‘ possessed with seven devils.’ ‘The female 
conscience,’ he observes, ‘when under the influence of 
passionate love, is capable of the most extravagant 
‘llusions. Often it is the abettor of its own dreams. 
Let us,’ he pleads, ‘draw a veil over these mysteries,’ 
and then beclouds the theme by a number of obser- 
vations to the effect that all the most ‘ splendid marvels’ 
and all ‘great faiths’ are the blossoming of some 
‘little deceit. Thus Mary, whom, as a foundress 
of the modern world, he ranks next to Jesus, is 
praised like her Master for greatly daring to impose 
upon mankind. 

Poor Mary! If this admirer’s sullying praise were 
true, her last state was indeed worse than the first. 
The ‘seven devils,’ which were once cast out, must 
have brought back seven times seven companions worse 
than themselves, before she could think of showing 
love to Jesus by giving His body to the worms in some 
secret spot, while her sisters were coming with costly 
spices for its embalmment, and by then feigning to 
have seen Him alive, and firing the imaginations of 
the disciples with her fraud. » 

The demands made upon our credulity, thus far, are 
enough to stagger all who retain some respect for 


The Resurrection of Christ. 305 


reason and morality; but our ‘cold fanalysis’ is not 
finished. We want to know, not only how these 
visionary appearances began, but why they were so 
few, and how they so speedily and suddenly ceased. 
. Renan suggests that they lasted about a year, and 
places the return of the disciples to Jerusalem as 
‘perhaps’ at the next Passover. The vision of the 
ascension, and the thunderstorm on the day of Pente- 
cost, he assigns also to the year after Christ’s death. 
He has not a syllable of history, or even a legend, to 
give colour to this supposition. It seems wildly im- 
probable that these men could have gone on fishing 
and partaking the common village life of Galilee with- 
out making any stir or sign for twelve months, and that 
then they should break out into enthusiasm and forsake 
all to preach Christ. Such a ‘perhaps’ is opposed to 
all we know of human nature, and it is inconceivable 
that so tardy a crusade should have stirred up such 
a commotion in Jerusalem as the first preaching 
undoubtedly produced. In any case, the fact to be 
accounted for is, that we have no legend of any appear- 
ance of Christ to His disciples, or to any one of them, 
after the fortieth day, and are only told of ten appear- 
ances in all. When imaginations are busy, and excited 
brains are seeing apparitions, such tales multiply, as 
Renan truly observes. Why, then, were they so sparse 
in this alleged epidemic ? How remarkable, too, is the 
fact that only three of these appearances were wit- 
nessed by individuals when alone! Mary’s brain 
created the fiction of one interview with Jesus, yet she 
never imagined or pretended to have a second. Peter 
saw his Master only once by Himself. John, whose 


200. 


306 wMelfe Mystery of God. 


loving and fervent nature should have produced effects 
second only to Mary’s, had no such dream. The only 
other intimate friend of Christ’s for whom the conta- 
gion wrought so personal a favour was the stern ascetic 
James—one of those brothers of Jesus who, previous. 
to His death, had not believed in Him, but who seems 
to have been converted by what he saw, inasmuch - 
as he became a chief ‘pillar’ of the primitive Church. 
Thirty years later, John had visions in Patmos, but 
these were distinctly described as such. Stephen also, 
in the Sanhedrin, had a vision of Jesus in the opened 
heavens; and Saul of Tarsus states that he saw Jesus 
in his journey to Damascus. But this exhausts the 
‘legends.’ In spite of this sparsity of appearances 
and their rapid cessation, the disciples went on preach- 
ing and teaching, and enduring persecution with un- 
abated ardour, moderation of conduct, meekness and 
purity of spirit, and with a commanding influence over 
the most varied orders of men. Still more remarkable 
for enthusiastic dreamers, these men always professed 
to be living in intimate fellowship with Him whom they 
had seen before, and hoped to see in heaven, but whom 
they never expected to see again on earth, by day or 
night, until they died. Such facts as these are abso- 
lutely incompatible with the mental conditions postu- 
lated by the visionary theory. 

The case of the Apostle Paul now requires attention. 
It might fairly be claimed that if the visionary theory 
fails to account for the earlier appearances of Christ, 
it is superfluous to discuss the last. The place occu- 
pied by Paul, however, is so unique, and the events 
associated with his conversion are so fully related, that 


The Resurrection of Christ. 307 


they deserve a separate examination. If, in some re- 
spects, this should involve a retracing of ground already 
covered, it will have the advantage of bringing the. 
principles involved into bolder prominence. | 
The main facts of Paul’s life are not in dispute. It. 
is known that at the time of his appearance on the 
scene, the rulers of the Jews in Jerusalem were, owing 
to peculiar political circumstances, possessed of eccle- 
siastical authority over their countrymen in Syria. 
It is admitted that Paul actually started from the, 
capital armed with power to persecute Christians in 
Damascus: that he entered that city a blinded man, 
all his enmity to Christ extinguished; and that instead 
of carrying out his commission, he became a preacher 
of the faith he had laboured to destroy. Trivial dif- 
ferences exist in the two accounts of this incident pre- 
served in the Acts of the Apostles, but they relate to 
matters of no moment, and are not supposed by the 
most hostile criticism to cast doubt on the general 
facts related. Those who believe in verbal infallibility 
are somewhat exercised to weld these minute details 
into one harmonious and inclusive story; but it suffices 
for our purposes to observe that, according to both 
accounts, Paul alone saw Jesus, and only he heard the 
words which smote him to repentance. The sole ques- 
tion to be decided is, Was there a really objective 
appearance of Christ to Paul, or can the known facts 
of the case be accounted for on natural grounds? 
Renan, whose explanations of the earlier phenomena 
have been reviewed, displays an equal amount of bold- 
ness and ingenuity in reconstructing the Pauline history. 
At the outset, he pictures Saul as full of remorse when 
20-72 


308 The Mystery of God. 


drawing near to Damascus. After many years of re- 
flection, Paul declared that he had been actuated by a 
sense of duty in all his anti-Christian activities; but 
Renan says it was not so, and we are left to decide 
which of these two witnesses is the more credible. 
He pictures him as liking those ‘ excellent sectarians,’ 
the Nazarenes, rather than breathing out threatenings 
and slaughter, and as already being haunted by the 
‘sweet face’ of their Master. As he drew near the 
city, he could not bear to go on. While in this state 
of mind, material nature, ever kind to Christianity in 
those primitive days, lent the aid of a thunderstorm. 
The thunder smote the excited mind of Saul as the 
voice of Jesus; a flash of lightning blinded him; a 
delirious fever resulting from sunstroke seized him. 
All this produced, as well it might, a high degree of 
cerebral excitement; and so the result of these com- 
bined circumstances was that Saul held an imaginary 
talk with Jesus, became a converted man, and was 
impressed with the idea that he was to convert many 
nations! Surely a very beautiful and sublime notion 
to be produced even by such a rich variety of causa- 
tions; but the most singular part of the story is that 
Paul’s delirious imagination proved prophetic of events 
which have changed the current of the world’s history! 

But even here, coincidences did not cease. Paul was 
a prey to blindness and delirium in the city to which 
he was led, and so neither ate nor drank. ‘It is easy 
to imagine what passed,’ says Kenan, ‘during this 
crisis in that burning brain, maddened by violent 
disease.’ The only thing he names, however, is that 
this maddened being heard of a disciple called Ananias, 


The Resurrection of Christ. 309 


and became convinced that at a touch from him he 
would recover. Ananias, being told of this, came, and 
saluting the enemy of his faith as ‘brother Saul,’ laid 
his hand upon his head, and from that hour peace > 
returned to Paul’s troubled soul. ‘ He believed him- 
self cured ; and as his ailment had been purely nervous, 
he was so.’ Prodigious! Here isa man smitten with 
delirious fever by sunstroke, and with eyes ‘ highly in- 
flamed’ and utterly blinded by a flash of lightning ; 
yet his ailment was only ‘nervous,’ and at a touch of 
kind hands he was made well! Who that believes this 
will doubt the miracles of Christ ? 

To this abysmal depth of irrationalism we are asked 
to descend in order to reach the miserable conviction 
that this world is ‘ betrayed by fate,’ and that Wisdom 
has refused to console our sorrowful race. We are 
asked to believe not only that this story, worthy of the 
‘ Arabian Nights,’ is true, but to accept all the conse- 
quences. Europe and America owe their religion to 
this occurrence! Those profound discussions of human 
nature and divine government which enrich Paul’s works 
are the fruit of sunstroke acting on a remorseful mind ! 
That hymn of love which has not only charmed but 
purified the affections of many nations was the outcome 
of a heart which was cleansed and glorified into an 
altar of living sacrifice by delirious dreams! Those 
writings which have been the admiration of myriads, 
and which, next to the words of Christ, are still the 
most potent forces in the formation of character and 
opinion—all these things are traceable to a thunder- 
storm terrifying and striking with disease a man who 
was persecuting a few excellent enthusiasts! If any 


‘ 3410 : The Mystery of God. 


'man seriously believes this, I know not what to say, 
- except that surely he also must have been smitten by 
the sun ! 

By abjuring all attempts to reconstruct the history 
in accordance with their hypothesis, many advocates 
of the visionary theory think to escape the follies which 
the French Academician so gallantly labours to conceal 
- under the gold-leaf of a brilliant style. So abstaining, 
they may justly plead that no single failure, or series of 
failures, can be held to prove the absolute impossibility 
of the task which they eschew. But while we refrain 
from fastening the more absurd details of Renan’s 
romance on those who decline to be bound by his 
inventions, it must none the less be insisted that the 
chief difficulties which he vainly strove to surmount 
are, from their very nature, insurmountable, and that no 
ingenuity, however great, will ever be able to reconcile 
the language and conduct of Paul with anything less 
‘than such an objective appearance of Christ as the 
Christian Church has always believed in as an historic 
fact. | 

One very remarkable expression has been much 
dwelt upon as giving Paul’s own sanction to a subjec- 
tive interpretation of his vision. In one of his letters 
he writes: ‘It was the good pleasure of God... to 
reveal His Son in me’ (Gal. i. 15, 16), and the context 
shows beyond doubt that the phrase refers to the time 
of his conversion. Strauss fastened on these words ‘in 
me’ as a proof that the Apostle deemed the whole 
transaction an inward one. Renan discredits the in- 
terpretation, and renders the words ev «wot, ‘ for me,’ 
instead of ‘in me;’ but this suggestion cannot be main- 


The Resurrection of Christ. BUT 


tained against those who insist on the literal translation. 
The visionary theory, however, is not helped by this 
admission, unless it can be shown that Paul spoke of a 
subjective revelation to the exclusion of one which was 
objective, or that he regarded the one as independent 
of the other. 

No Christian of any school would dispute the fact 
that Paul believed in an inward and spiritual revelation 
of Christ, or that, to his mind, this was of infinitely 
greater importance than any external sight. The light 
which dimmed the brightness of the noon-day sunshine 
was not worthy to be compared with that which irra- 
diated his heart when God shined into it, ‘to give the 
light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face 
of Jesus Christ’ (2 Cor. iv. 6). Paul had no desire to 
discern his Lord again in a material form on earth. 
He was ready to affirm, ‘though we have known Christ 
after the flesh, yet now we know Him so no more’ 
(2 Cor. v. 16), and was content with the spiritual inter- 
course of prayer and worship, until in a glorified body 
he might attain a new vision and know even as he was 
known. But none of these things preclude the reality, 
or lower the value of that sight which astonished and 
blinded him as he walked. The much quoted words 
which renounce the wish for physical perceptions of 
Christ contain a distinct assertion that he had once 
known Him after the flesh, and the revelation of Christ 
‘in’ Paul, being assigned to the date of his fleshly 
interview, emphatically accords with the belief that the 
natural was in some way a prelude to, or a medium of, 
the spiritual. The mere spectacle of Jesus in a bodily 
form could not flame into Paul’s heart a true knowledge 


312 ‘The Mystery of God. 


of His nature and mind. In answer to Peter’s con- 
_fession, ‘Thou art the Christ, the Son of the Living 
God,’ Christ replied, ‘ Blessed art thou, Simon Bar- 
Jonah: for flesh and blood hath not revealed it unto 
thee, but My Father which is in heaven’ (Matt. xvi. 17). 
Yet Peter received not that spiritual revelation apart 
from or in independence of the visible ‘ Man, Christ 
Jesus,’ with whom he walked and talked, and on 
whose gracious face he gazed while making his 
memorable confession. The subjective revelation was 
in this case inseparably connected with the objective, 
nor can we imagine how it could have been otherwise 
conveyed. The inward illumination was a discovery 
of things pertaining to Christ which lay behind the veil 
of ‘flesh and blood,’ but. the essential nature of the 
discovery was, that behind that veil there truly dwelt 
such an exalted Being as Peter’s words describe. The 
spiritual revelation was thus entirely concerned about 
the objective personality of Christ ; and Paul’s language 
about his own experience answers precisely to this case. 
The Son who was revealed ‘in’ him was evidently in 
Paul’s judgment the Son who appeared to him by the 
way, and the Son whom he straightway began to 
preach, not as an ideal of his own, but as a crucified, 
buried, and risen Being, who still lived, not merely in 
spirit, but in a ‘ glorious body’ in heaven. 

Another passage on which great stress is laid as 
favouring a subjective interpretation of Paul’s vision, is 
that in which he speaks of various ‘ visions and revela- 
tions of the Lord’ (2 Cor. xii. 1). It cannot be affirmed 
that these were all objective appearances of Christ, and 
the general opinion is that some of them were not. 


The Resurrection of Chrost. 2 
‘Why, then,’ it is asked, ‘should we single out the 
earliest revelation as if it differed in nature from all 
the rest? Why should we not, at any rate, allow its 
character to remain an open question on which differ- 
ences of opinion are to be tolerated ?’ 

The only way of replying to this appeal is to examine 
Paul’s utterances and see whether he leaves room for 
any reasonable doubt. Concerning some of these 
‘visions and revelations’ we have no means of arriving 
at any certain conclusion. Where the Apostle has only 
made casual references, and omitted to define his own 
convictions, it would be presumptuous for his readers 
to dogmatise respecting the precise nature of the occur- 
rences; nor can we profess to be wiser than he, when, 
as is the case sometimes, he has left-on record his 
own ignorance and uncertainty. All that I care to 
contend for is that he expresses no doubt of his own, 
and that he does not leave room for the visionary 
hypothesis in his narratives of what occurred at his 
conversion. 

The most important vision of which he has given a 
clear account is that described in 2 Cor. xu. This, 
therefore, is the one which best admits of comparison 
with the incidents of his conversion. Of this vision 
Paul, writing fourteen years afterwards, speaks with 
much reticence, with a singular sobriety of spirit, and 
in carefully measured terms. He affirms that in some 
way he was ‘caught up into Paradise,’ but whether ‘in 
the body or apart from the body,’ he knew not, and that 
he there saw and heard things which he was not allowed 
to relate. He then states that a thorn in the flesh was 
given him that he ‘should not be exalted overmuch.’ 


314 ; The Mystery of God. 


Setting these statements side by side with the accounts 
of what took place on the road to Damascus, it will be 
found that the two narratives abound in striking con- 
trasts. The earlier vision was not in ‘ paradise,’ but on 
earth. It occurred ona piece of common road travelled 
by thousands of Paul’s hearers and readers. There was 
no uncertainty about his condition at the time. He 
was not ‘in Christ,’ but was assuredly ‘in the body,’ 
and was surrounded by a number of anti-Christian 
companions, who were amazed by the light which 
arrested their leader. The words of the Person who 
talked with Paul are distinctly given, and His name 
is mentioned in a way which precludes a mystical in- 
_terpretation. He speaks of Himself not as ‘the Christ,’ 
or ‘the Lord,’ or the ‘Son of God,’ but. as * Jesus’; 
and as if to lenda further touch of mundane realism, 
the place of human residence is added, ‘I am Jesus of 
Nazareth, whom thou persecutest’ (Acts xxi. 8). 

These differences are so broad and obvious, that it 
is a matter for surprise that any student of Paul’s 
writings could overlook them. They show that if we 
distinguish between the two events, it is not in an 
arbitrary spirit, but because the Apostle leaves no 
option. His vague and even dubious language about 
the vision in paradise permits uncertainty concerning 
its character (although even that was manifestly some- 
thing more than a subjective vision in his own opinion) ; 
but the clear, explicit, and material details of the earthly 
appearance compel us to acknowledge that Paul de- 
scribes what he regarded as an event as truly historical 
as the death of Stephen, and his own persecution of 
the Church. 


The Resurrection of Chrast. 315 


_. Unanswerable as the argument thus far appears, it 
may be supported by other proofs which alone would 
be sufficient. If we pass from the descriptions of these 
events to the use made of them, it will become evident 
that Paul singled out the first revelation of Jesus of 
Nazareth, and consistently discriminated between it 
and every subsequent experience. In the course of his 
public ministry he was frequently impeded by men who 
denied his apostleship, because, unlike the eleven, he 
had not shared the companionship of Christ. It is 
probable that many men of small spiritual discern- 
ment, but who had beheld Jesus in the days of His 
flesh, went about the world boasting of this privilege 
as if it rendered them superior to Paul. But Paul’s 
rejoinder to his questioners was one which would have 
been both absurd and fraudulent unless his own sight 
of Christ had been of the same nature as that of which 
these men prated, and which the earlier Apostles en- 
joyed. ‘Am I not an Apostle?’ he exclaims. ‘ Have 
I not seen Jesus our Lord?’ (1 Cor. ix. 1). To sup- 
pose that when the Apostle wrote this challenge he was 
only referring to such a spiritual vision of Christ as he 
shared with all Christians in the world, is to impute to 
him a depth of duplicity or a height of folly which no 
reader of his works would ever credit. It is also to be 
remarked that here also the earthly name ‘ Jesus’ is 
used. 

In the same letter he recited his gospel; viz., ‘ That 
Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures ; 
and that He was buried; and that He hath been raised 
on the third day according to the Scriptures ; and that 
He appeared to Cephas; then to the twelve; then He 


316 The Mystery of God. 


appeared to above five hundred brethren at once; ... 
then He appeared to James; then to all the Apostles ; 
and last of all, as to one born out of due time, He 
appeared to me also’ (1 Cor. xv. 3-8). It will be ob- 
served that these several appearances are adduced not 
as disclosures of spiritual truth, but as evidences of 
historic fact. The persons named are cited as wit- 
nesses of objective realities without which the faith of 
the Corinthians would be vain. A merely ‘subjective 
resurrection’ could scarcely have been assigned, and 
thereby restricted as a single occurrence, to ‘ the third 
day ; nor could Paul have remarked concerning it 
‘last of all. ... He appeared to me also.’ These 
words ‘last of all’ demonstrate that Paul esteemed the 
incident on the road to Damascus the close of a limited 
number of interviews between the risen Christ and a 
few selected witnesses, of whom he claimed to be one. 
Such a phrase never could have been used respecting 
an inward and spiritual illumination like that which 
Paul believed all his converts had received, and which 
may be equally the privilege of men to-day or a thousand 
years hence. 

Even here the proof is not exhausted. In this same 
chapter Paul founds upon the resurrection of Christ a 
doctrine of resurrection for all believers. Not, be it 
observed, as some theories would imply, a doctrine of 
Christ’s resurrection in the renewed lives of His dis- 
ciples, but the revival of those who, having died, have 
been buried like seeds in the dust of the earth, but are 
one day to be awakened and meet Christ in His mani- 
fested glory. Theargument which Paul elaborated was 
not to show the possibility of a mystical renewal of the 


The Resurrection of Christ. Ey, 


perfect life of Christ in Corinthian worshippers, but to 
show the mystery of that change whereby the seed 
which is sowed in weakness and corruption is to be 
raised in power and incorruption. His view was that 
imitators of Christ’s self-sacrificing life are of all men 
most miserable if there be no future career for those 
who suffer for righteousness’ sake on earth. He con- 
tends that apart from the bodily resurrection of Christ 
men have no hope of such a sequel; and he stakes his 
own character, and the characters of all his fellow 
Apostles, on the truth of their united testimony to that 
Historic fact. *1f Christ is preached: that. He. hath 
been raised from the dead, how say some among you 
that there is no resurrection of the dead? But if 
there is no resurrection of the dead, neither hath Christ 
been raised: and if Christ hath not been raised, then 
is our preaching vain, your faith also is vain. Yea, 
and we are found false witnesses of God ; because we 
witnessed of God that He raised up Christ ; whom He 
raised not up, if so be that the dead are not raised ’ 
(1 Cor. xv. 12-15). 

In the face of such language it is idle to suppose 
that genius will ever be able to reconcile Paul’s words 
and conduct with a ‘subjective’ theory of his own 
vision of Christ. 

The only remaining theory of the Resurrection is 
that which accepts the statements of the New Testa- 
ment in their natural historical sense ; viz., that Jesus, 
who lived, died, and was buried, rose up from the 
grave, and was thus declared to be the Son of God 
with power. 

If the phenomena occurred in the ordinary course 


318 selec, Mystery of God. 


of nature, it must be possible to suggest some ex- 
planation of them which shall at least be conceivably 
true. In the absence of any such explanation, and in 
full view of the conspicuous failure of all the attempts 
which have been made to provide one, the Christian 
inference is entitled to claim our acceptance. All 
the possibilities, probabilities, desirabilities, and moral 


necessities which have been considered in previous 


chapters converge to sustain this inference as reason- 
able, and to secure respect for the direct testimony 
which, taken alone, establishes the phenomena beyond 
dispute. 

Glancing back over the long series of objections to 
the Christian faith which have been encountered, it 
will be noticed that they are broadly divisible into two 
main classes, philosophical and critical, and that the 
writers who urge them may be separated with tolerable 
distinctness into two corresponding groups. When this 


partition is observed, a very remarkable and economical. 


division of labour becomes apparent. Philosophers de- 
volve the examination of Christian testimony upon 
critical experts, and critics leave the more arduous 
task of elaborating abstract arguments to philosophers. 
Thus, neither party accepts the responsibility of estab- 
lishing a complete case against Christianity. It would 
be idle to complain of this natural and perhaps in- 
evitable arrangement, but it is highly important that 
we should guard against some fallacious impressions 
which it may easily produce. In the olden time a cer- 
tain city was assaulted at the same hour by two armies, 
one operating on the western and the other on the 
eastern side. Neither army was able to effect an en- 


The Resurrection of Christ. 319 


trance, but each summoned the city to surrender on 
the ground that further resistance was useless, because 
the assault on the other side had been successful. 
Something similar to this has taken place in modern 
controversy. The idea of collusion between two great 
branches of literature is preposterous, and therefore 
no one will suspect either philosophy or criticism of 
an unprincipled ruse de guerre. Controversial allies 
are not likely to be very severe judges of each other’s 
performances, and may be excused from moral blame 
if they award to those friends a victory which exists’ 
only in their own sanguine estimation. But however 
accounted for, the facts are obvious. Philosophy con- 
fesses that on abstract grounds the Christian revelation 
is not incredible, and that its claims can only be decided 
by evidence; yet it calls upon us to renounce faith 
because criticism is said to have proved the evidences 
insufficient. Criticism breaks down in its repeated 
endeavours to destroy the Christian testimony, yet 
still summons us to relinquish faith, because philosophy 
has proved the things which it affirms to be natural 
impossibilities.* 

Before commencing this chapter, the chief hindrances 
raised by philosophy and criticism had been examined, 
and for all who assented to the conclusions reached, the 
resurrection of Christ, instead of appearing an impro- 
bability, was already so probable that it was almost a 
necessity of thought. We have now found that the 
outward phenomena of Christ’s life, death, and resur- 


* The justice of these statements may be seen by comparing 
certain representative quotations, which will be found on pp. 156, 
157, and 181—183. 


220 The Mystery of God, 


rection are beyond dispute. We have also seen that, 
- even when viewed by themselves, they can neither be 
accounted for by illusion, nor by fraud, nor by the 
two combined, even though supplemented by a sur- 
prising series of accidental coincidences such as Renan 
so liberally invents. But these facts are not alone. 
They stand related to those phenomena of Hebrew 
literature which by themselves require us to regard the 
Bible as a God-provided book. They are the centre 
of a prolonged course of history stretching from Abra- 
ham to our own day, and spreading over an ever- 
widening space, as the ancient oracle announced. A 
life thus heralded and followed stands alone in the 
midst of the ages, and is incomparable with any other 
that can be named. Around the grave of Christ so 
many marvels cluster, that if He did not rise from the 
dead, the facts which then call for explanation are 
quite as miraculous as His asserted resurrection, and, 
because deprived of their only moral significance, they 
are immeasurably more difficult to believe. 

I submit, therefore, that the only two alternatives 
now open to our choice are either to dismiss the whole 
matter from our minds as a mystery upon which we 
decline to bestow any further attention; or to accept 
the resurrection as a fact of history, and with it 
Christ’s superhuman claims, and the Bible of which 
He is the central theme as a God-provided book, and 
its teachings and counsels as the guide of life. 

With respect to the first of these alternatives I shall 
say but little. Every man must consider for himself 
what is the true line of wisdom and duty, and I pre- 
sume not in this place to use any urgency. We should 


Lhe Resurrection of Christ. aad 


not, however, conceal from ourselves the fact that to 
turn away our thoughts from Christ involves a judg- 
ment that His claims are unworthy of respect. The 
Gospel, which offers certain blessings in His name, 
places Christ before each hearer as truly as He was 
placed before Pilate, and no hand-washing can relieve 
from responsibility those who find no fault in Him, 
yet leave Him to the scorn and rejection of the 
world. 

But whatever may be done by individuals, mankind 
at large will not cease to think of Christ. By a re- 
sistless fascination He attracts the intensest interest 
wherever He is preached, and, as a rule, neither those 
who believe nor those who disbelieve can ‘let Him 
alone.’ The future prospects of our race in this world 
and of individual lives beyond the grave are so bound 
up with the falsity or verity of His continued existence 
and reign, that some elucidation of the facts is every- 
where demanded. The scheme of moral government 
of which He is the centre, and of which the Bible is 
the exponent, is the only one which harmonizes the 
terrible facts of pain and moral evil with man’s spiritual 
aspirations, and with the goodness of the Creator. If 
Christ be unworthy of man’s faith, the hopes by which 
the noblest leaders of humanity in ancient times were 
inspired were vain. If Christ fails us, then Abraham’s 
faith was false, and his expectation of a conquering 
seed, which survived through numberless generations, 
was a baseless figment, and its marvellous accomplish- 
ment in history must be due toa combination of Fraud 
and Fate in league together to deceive and tantalize 
mankind by illusions so beautiful that they are only 


21 


322 The Mystery of God. 


not Divine because not true. In this ‘case the millions 
- who have been purified from wicked ways and thoughts 
have been washed in a fountain of lying legends; the 
sacrifices whereby nations have been redeemed from 
barbarism and debasing superstitions, and those martyr- 
doms by which the mind has been emancipated from 
despotic bonds, have been inspired by belief in a vast 
imposture; the happy lives of quiet ministry and 
patient endurance which teem behind the more ob- 
trusive show of worldly activities in Christian lands 
are sustained by sanctifying and ennobling fictions ; 
and the countless hosts who have died in the hope 
of ‘an inheritance incorruptible and undefiled, and 
that fadeth not away’ have been like men dying in a 
desert with a deceitful mirage glowing before their eyes. 
If Christ be renounced, then all faith that God has given 
oracles to men is absurd; the entire scheme of re- 
demption which fills the Scriptures dies like a dream ; 
man’s fall from innocency remains a miserable fact, 
and his return to the dust is still inevitable, but the 
thought of rising again to sit on thrones of victory 
ceases to be a tenable imagination. If all this be lost, 
God’s silence then denies His goodness. Without 
evidence of goodness, His power must loom before our 
thought as a dreadful attribute displayed in calamities, 
disease, and death, rather than in words and acts of 
mercy. Without goodness, His wisdom sinks down 
to a mere mechanician’s skill, and, lacking moral 
quality, affords no theme for praise. From such a 
silent and indifferent God the world might excusably 
turn away; and man’s best hope would be the heaven 
of Pessimism, where the wicked cease from troubling 


The Resurrection of Christ. 523 


even to repent, and where the righteous are at rest 
from their unsatisfied desire. 

With such tremendous issues depending on the truth 
or falsity of the Christian faith, the world will not dis- . 
miss the claims of Christ from its attention. But I 
am well aware that when the mind is driven by its own 
operations into an apparently final dilemma, it does 
not always choose the more reasonable opinion and 
cordially embrace it. Still less do we feel disposed to 
adopt a conclusion to which the reasonings of another 
mind would conduct us. Where no contrary prejudice 
is at work, and even where the wishes are distinctly 
favourable, the very forms of logic seem to arouse 
opposition or to awaken distrust. If, therefore, the 
argument, up to this point, has been approved, and if 
the reader has felt the dilemma now before us to be 
the real and ultimate issue of religious thought, it by 
no means follows that he will either cease to think 
about Christ, which is almost an impossibility, or that 
he will believe in Christ’s superhuman claims and His 
resurrection from the dead. 

Against this belief there lies in thousands of minds 
to-day a heavy weight of intellectual habit. The 
theories and criticisms of unbelief may be disposed 
of as inconclusive and unsound, but the feeling of 
suspicion may remain. Deeper than all contrary 
creeds, there is the fear of believing what is super- 
sensuous, and a distrust of any conclusion on which 
many intellectual leaders look down as the marks of 
defective education in science and philosophy, or as 
the indications of a naturally feeble and credulous 
— mind. 

Alo 


B24 The Mystery of God. 


Such prepossessions as these are not the only oppo- 
sitions which the Christian faith has to encounter. 
The Christian hope appeals to the purest and sublimest 
yearnings of human nature, but it calls for the mortifi- 
cation of many cravings which are immensely strong. 
It summons men to direct their energies towards a 
remote and invisible goal, and thus involves a modera- 
tion of zeal in the pursuit of those earthly objects 
which excite the passions, and sometimes requires their 
entire relinquishment. The call of Christ is to a 
throne of glory, but the glory 1s one not easily ob- 
tained. It is a glory of victory over the temptations 
which assail men through the senses, and over many 
prevalent fashions of thought, taste, and practice by 
which those around are dominated. The rewards of 
Christ, though described in figurative language, are 
essentially moral and spiritual, and are such as do not 
appeal to our hearts except in hours of moral wakeful- 
ness, and in times when the glamour with which earthly 
things are invested by love, or ambition, or inferior 
appetites, has been dissipated by a stern experience. 
The recognition of Christ’s claims is, therefore, mixed 
up with many conflictive thoughts and inclinations, and 
generally implies some readiness to deny self, and to 
follow in the footsteps of One who was always com- 
passionate towards man’s infirmities, and very merciful 
to his unrighteousness, yet who asks great things of His 
disciples, and leads them not seldom to a cross. 

Such hindrances to faith as are thus imperfectly 
suggested can never be removed by purely intellectual 
methods. No force of reasoning can coerce those 
spiritual conditions in which Christ is discerned as 


The Resurrection of Christ. 328 


the true Lord and Leader of the soul, without whose 
guidance life is a journey which closes with a grave in 
the wilderness. My aim has been to show that the 
severest processes of thought conduct the man of cul-. 
ture to the same standpoint for the contemplation of 
Christ’s spiritual claims as is occupied by the untutored 
peasant or the simple child, and leave him free to yield 
up his nature to the influences of Christ. If to any it 
should seem that this is a poor termination to so pro- 
longed a process, that opinion should be reconsidered. 
A religion which comes forth from God, and is designed 
to deal with all men equally, must be one which places 
the wise and the unwise on the same level, and puts 
both classes to the same spiritual proof. If the wise 
man has to travel over a hard and dangerous road 
before he can stand in his maturity where he stood 
yin childhood, it is only because the mind, once started 
on a course of independent thinking, can only return 
with conscious honesty to bow before the Eternal 
Teacher when it has sincerely found that this is its 
true wisdom, and that elsewhere there exists no place 
of mental rest. If the intellectual journey be thus 
terminated, the thinker will not complain of his toil 
nor regret the sufferings he has endured, neither will 
he murmur because it brings him side by side with 
those who have never felt the need of such far travels, 
but have trusted to the seeing of their hearts. The 
door which opens into a Father’s house should be one 
through which the least and lowliest can pass; and if 
high thinking were to bring men to a secret entrance, 
hidden from the masses of mankind, it would reflect 
upon the wisdom and goodness of Him whose special 


326 The Mystery of God. 


care should be bestowed upon those who most require 
- His aid. If Christ had thanked God that the secret 
of the kingdom had been hidden from babes and 
sucklings, but revealed to the wise and prudent, it 
would have been a terrible impeachment of the Father. 
If God be man’s Father, a childlike spirit should be 
the sole condition of His favour and blessing. All that 
philosophy and criticism can do in the production of 
this spirit is to undo what they may have done towards 
its destruction, and to leave the soul, untrammelled by 
intellectual suspicions, to rejoice in any light that may 
shine into it from a spiritual source. If Christ is to be 
received into the heart, He must approve Himself as 
worthy to be crowned the King of kings and Lord of 
lords. Logic can only be the handmaid of our higher 
faculties of insight, by showing that we are justified in 
believing that the Scriptures give a true account of what 
He was, and said, and did; and that we do no violence 
to reason, and contradict no verified knowledge, when, 
standing in this conquered space, we say with the 
fisherman of Galilee, ‘ Thou art the Christ, the Son of 
the living God.’ 


Cou EU es ¢ 
THE LIFE OF FAITH. 


Ir is now proclaimed to the world that He who died 
and rose again, and was seen a few times by chosen 
witnesses, still lives in a glorified state, though no 
more seen by mortal eyes. We are invited to believe 
that His interest in the world has not diminished, and 
that, apart from accidents of form and place, He is 
‘the same yesterday, to-day, and for ever.’ We are 
offered no physical evidence of His presence, but 
are assured that He is as truly acquainted with our 
inmost needs and thoughts, and as truly accessible to 
poor and contrite souls, as when He sat by the seashore, 
or crossed the flowery hills of Galilee, or stood in 
the courts of the temple in Jerusalem. We are urged 
to put our lives under His direction; to accept His 
recorded life as our example; His words as our counsel; 
His death as the inviolable pledge of God’s eternal love, 
and the declaration of His righteousness in the passing 
by of sin; and His resurrection as the sign of the 
Divine will to confer on all who are united to Him by 
inward loyalty and trust ‘an inheritance incorruptible 
and undefiled, and that fadeth not away.’ ‘ We walk 
by faith, not by sight,’ wrote Paul; and all men every- 
where are counselled to be his followers in this, and to 


9 


328 Lhe Mystery of God. 


view life as a pilgrimage towards an unseen country 
‘where Christ reigns, and where His servants shall see 
His face and do Him service evermore. 

It has often been supposed that faith 1s demanded 
in Scripture in an arbitrary manner, and that there is 
no natural or necessary reason why it should play SO 
important a part in the Christian religion. Reflection 
will show, however, that without faith no intercourse 
with another spiritual Being is possible, and no wise 
direction of the energies is conceivable. Without a 
measure of faith it is impossible to maintain inter- 
course even with our fellow men. Without faith, 
business is arrested, commerce perishes, friendship 
ceases, families are dissolved, society collapses, and fear 
begets a reign of terrible suspicion, wherein every man’s 
hand is against his neighbour, and human life becomes 
a burden too grievous to be borne. Faith is thus the 
law of all intelligent and friendly intercourse, and is 
indispensable in a religion which is to bind nations 
into one brotherhood before the Great Father. It is 
not merely because God is unseen that faith is thus 
essential. It would not cease to be so if the heavenly 
Potentate were visible as the sun at noonday, or if He 
were to come down daily to talk with us in the cool 
evening twilight, as He descended in the sacred idyl 
of paradise. 

But while faith is thus the only conceivable means 
of fellowship with God, many shrink from its exercise ; 
and I propose now to examine some of the reasons 
assigned for this reluctance. 

One of the most common motives for refusing to allow 
faith any place in the scheme of life is the fear that, if the 


Pe I ne a 


The Life of Fatrth. 329 


mind once suffers its convictions to overpass the limits 
of knowledge which can be scientifically verified, no 
safeguard remains against the admission of all pro- 
fessedly supernatural events. The world has teemed . 
with prodigies alleged to have been wrought by various 
deities and demi-gods, and by the dead bones or living 
hands of saints. To-day things which, if actually 
accomplished, can be nothing less than miraculous, 
are freely boasted of by the Roman Catholic Church, 
and by various other sects and communities. Without 
undergoing the toil of examining all these ancient 
legends and modern marvels, most people dismiss them 
as unworthy of attention. Multitudes of Christians, 
who accept the miracles of the Bible, repudiate others 
from an almost instinctive feeling that they are less 
trustworthy, though without presuming or deigning to 
say on what principle they draw a line of demarcation. 
But logical minds are scarcely satisfied with this rather 
facile process of selection. They want some definite 
reasons to be assigned for so sharp a distinction, and 
often insist that no such reasons can be found. It is 
urged that if we accept one group of supernatural 
events as real, we are bound to admit at least the 
abstract possibility of all being equally genuine; and 
then the rather awkward dilemma is pressed home— 
‘Either we must abandon our minds to the inroad of 
every fabulous invention, or else we must take the 
pains of investigating such vast masses of evidence as 
would consume the major part of life, and respecting 
which we are practically assured beforehand that not a 
thousandth part, if any at all, would repay our toil.’ 

In reply to this argument, it must be conceded that 


330 The Mystery of God. 


the principles which have been relied upon to prove the 
- possibility of a Divine Revelation do forbid us to deny 
the philosophic possibility of any alleged miracle being 
genuine. Whatever may be the real or supposed 
dangers of such an admission, we have no alternative 
but to make it. The winking of a Madonna and the 
liquefaction of the blood of St. Januarius are no 
more to be disproved on abstract grounds of physical 
impossibility than the resurrection of Christ. All three 
are impossible if there be no God, but to Him who 
made the heavens and the earth, none of them would 
present any difficulty, if He saw fit to so exercise His 
Will. But the perils involved in this admission are far 
less than is commonly imagined. The ‘ History of 
Human Error,’ which Mr. Caxton meant to publish, 
would have shown conclusively that no theoretic scepti- 
cism has availed to protect men from the extravagances 
of superstition. Nothing, indeed, except the possession 
of infinite wisdom and knowledge, could render man’s 
judgment perfectly secure against deception. But 
rightly understood and applied, the principles already 
considered constitute the most effective safeguard 
which philosophy can furnish. The law of continuity 
in the method of Divine Government, renders some 
revelation a moral necessity; but it is equally cogent 
to convince us that supernatural events will be so 
rare as not to interfere with faith in the reign of law, 
i.e. in the regularity and order of the universe under 
the sovereignty of an unchanging God. Such events 
are necessary for the communication of some know- 
ledge of God and of His Will to men; but whoever 
‘believes in the Bible as a book of God’s providing, 


The Life of Fath. ou 


in the sufficiency of Christ’s moral teachings, the wisely 
measured reticence of His statements concerning un- 
seen realms and future things, the wide-reaching signi- 
ficance of His miracles, the expedience of His going - 
away from sight, together with the rarity of His appear- 
ances to a few selected witnesses after the Resurrection 
—whoever believes in these things will also strongly 
feel the unlikelihood of any new miraculous revelation, 
until Christ Himself shall come again. 

But we are not left to mere probabilities in this 
matter. The same principles which commend the 
Christian revelation as credible, provide a preliminary 
test which may be applied to all alleged miracles, and 
it is one which suffices to dismiss almost all, whether 
ancient or modern, as unworthy of serious considera- 
tion. Only for the greatest purposes can we suppose 
that the Almighty will think it wise or needful to 
interpose some exceptional act of will within the 
ordinary course of nature. If, therefore, trivial, unin- 
structive, or capricious miracles are physically possible, 
they are morally impossible ; and we may ask, respect- 
ing any reported marvel, Is this event associated with 
a truly great and godlike purpose? That is a test 
which may be applied without any expenditure of time 
or labour. It requires no tedious sifting of evidence. 
The mind can use it, and will instinctively do so, when- 
ever a tale is heard, or read, and its use will repel the 
invasion of lying wonders more effectually than any 
theoretic scepticism. The miracles related in Romanist 
lives of primitive and medizval saints, and the modern 
miracles asserted by priests and nuns, are so puerile, 
so devoid of moral dignity and aim, so unfitted to add 


230 The Mystery of God. 


a single ray of light to our ideas of God, so well-fitted 


- to obscure true faith in Him and to contradict some of 


the sublimest teachings of Scripture, that no one who 
apprehends the spirit and doctrine of Christ will be 
troubled to investigate their evidences. The whole 
category of so-called spiritualistic phenomena, such as 
table-turning, spirit-rapping, necromancy, etc., may be 
thrust aside for similar reasons. They are so unutter- 
ably foolish, that if produced by spirits, they must 
evidently be wrought by the ghosts of deceased lunatics 
and imbeciles, and as such are unworthy of attention. 
They are far less marvellous than the best tricks of 
honest conjurers; and thoughtful persons who believe 
in the great God declared by Christ, and appreciate 
the nature of that kingdom which He has established 
on the earth, will view such phenomena with sorrowful 
contempt. If students choose to investigate them for 
scientific purposes, we may cordially wish them a 
reward for their labours ; and if professional magicians 
search them out in order to devise money-getting enter- 
tainments, no one need object. But when one effect of 
supposed miracles is to bring notoriety and money to 
certain nunneries and monasteries, or parish priests, or 
to some strolling person of doubtful antecedents, the 
more thoroughly we believe in the Christian revelation, 
the more invulnerable we shall be to all such assaults 
on our credulity, and the less disposed to regard them 
as operations of the Spirit of God. 

It is important to observe that this test is practi- 
cally the same as was recommended in ancient times 
to the Hebrews, and afterwards to the Christian 
Church. In the Book of Deuteronomy we find intima- 


The Life of Fatth. 333 


tions of true prophets who were to be sent to the nation 
in later days, and of one great prophet in particular.* 
But with these intimations there were also clear warn- 
ings that false prophets and workers of deceitful wonders | 
would arise. The people would have great need, there- 
fore, of circumspection, and of some easily handled 
touchstone which plain persons might apply. If they 
were to receive as a Divine miracle every performance 
they lacked ability to explain, they would be at the 
mercy of each wandering trickster who had learned 
the arts of oriental magic. Hence Moses, who had 
looked behind the scenes of Egyptian craft, prepared 
the people to try the teachers who might court their 
allegiance. As one test of a professed prophet, he ad- 
monished them to watch the fulfilment or non-fulfilment 
of his prediction (Deut. xvill. 22). But this test alone 
was insufficient, because in some cases it would be 
inapplicable, and in others might be positively mis- 
leading. Where a prediction related to events not 
instantly impending, its first hearers might die before 
the question of fulfilment could be answered ; and as 
the result could only be known after it had transpired, 
such knowledge would always be obtained too late 
when the prophet founded immediate advice upon his 
prediction. It might also happen occasionally that a 
lucky or shrewd impostor’s prediction would come to 
pass. Therefore a more stringent and immediate test 
was supplied. If there arose in the midst of them a 
prophet, or a dreamer of dreams, and he gave them a 

%* It makes no difference to the value of the passage as employed 


in the text whether the authorship of Deuteronomy be assigned to 
Moses or to some later writer. 


334 The Mystery of God. 


sign or a wonder, and the sign or the wonder came to 
pass, whereof he spake; yet if the object of the sign 
were to withdraw from faith in the God of their fathers, 
or to induce a neglect of the moral law, they were not 
to hearken to that prophet, but were to regard his sign 
as a temptation to prove whether their hearts were 
loyal (Deut. xiii. 1-5). Similarly Christ forewarns that 
‘false Christs and false prophets’ will arise, and show 
‘esreat signs and wonders ;’ but His disciples are bidden 
to believe them not, because He declares that any new 
revelation of the true Lord from heaven will be broad 
and world-wide as the light which shines from the east 
unto the west (Matt. xxiv. 24-28), and therefore no more 
to be mistaken than midnight fireworks can be mistaken 
for the rising sun. At another time He counselled His 
followers, when estimating the credibility of professed 
prophets, to attach supreme importance to their per- 
sonal character and the moral quality of their teach- 
ings, saying, ‘Beware of false prophets, which come 
to you in sheep’s clothing, but inwardly are ravening 
wolves. By their fruits ye shall know them. Do men 
gather grapes of thorns, or figs of thistles ?’ (Matt. vii. 
TSes1 0). 

Similar passages might be quoted freely, but these 
suffice. This moral test, when applied in concert with 
the others named, clears the field of professed miracles 
in a wholesale manner. The myths of ancient Rome 
and Greece, and the tales which float about the cradles 
of several latter-day religions, cannot bear their touch. 
The legends of the Papacy, when subjected to them, 
show their spuriousness, as do false diamonds when 
held in flame. Nothing can be regarded as an act of 


The Life of Faith. TSBs 


Divine volition which would frustrate the will of God 
in the most important of all respects, or break the 
order of His moral government. God will not con- 
found our judgments; and if we believe that in Christ » 
He has intervened to promote righteousness and truth, 
we may stake our destiny on the refusal of any signs, 
however inexplicable, which would obscure or degrade 
that truth, or distract our hearts from singleness of 
service. 

Another cause of reluctance to allow faith in a 
Divine revelation any place in the scheme of life may 
be found in mistaken ideas of the nature of Christian 
faith, and of its true relation to knowledge which can 
be scientifically verified. To multitudes in our day 
faith is only a synonym for credulity. They look upon 
a Christian as a man who accepts a number of proposi- 
tions without a well-founded assurance of their intrinsic 
truth, and simply because he had been taught in child- 
hood that it was his duty to believe them, and to hold 
them fast under penalties of future judgment. 

It must be confessed that professedly Christian 
bodies are mainly responsible for this prevalent mis- 
take. The Roman Catholic Church, which claims to 
be the sole exponent of Christianity, maintains this 
view of faith. She demands an unquestioning accept- 
ance of her dogmas, not because the private judgment 
approves them as manifested truth, but because she 
affirms them. Cardinal Newman answers those who 
taunt him with believing the incredible doctrine of 
Transubstantiation by confessing, ‘I did not believe 
the doctrine till I was a Catholic. I had no difficulty 
in believing it as soon as I believed that the Roman 


336 The Mystery of God. 


Catholic Church was the oracle of God.’ He also 
observes, ‘From the time that I became a Catholic, 
of course I have no further history of my religious 
opinions to narrate.’* 

The Church of Rome is not alone in this view of 
faith. She is alone in the arrogance and consistency 
with which she enforces it; but some other Churches 
present their creeds and insist upon their acceptance 
rather than invite their examination. Hitherto a 
common rule has been that if people have endorsed 
these rigid statements of doctrine, they have been 
treated as Christian believers, although devoid of any 
zeal for God and righteousness; while, on the other 
hand, if men have dissented from these formulas, 
whether as contrary in their judgment to sound reason 
or to the verified facts of nature and history, or as 
‘ncorrect versions of the doctrine taught in Scripture, 
they have been branded as heretics and deprived of 
ecclesiastical privileges, even though they manifested 
a staunch and exultant attachment to Christ and what 
they understood to be His truth. Nothing, indeed, in 
all Church history is more painfully beautiful than the 
manner in which countless martyrs have been sustained 
by faith in God, while denounced as infidels, and while 
persecuted by those who were unworthy to call them 
brethren. 

It is not surprising that many have derived their 
conceptions of Christian faith from these notorious 
facts: but it must be strenuously insisted that the 
opinions so arrived at are not such as are inculcated in 
the Scriptures. Turning for information to the Bible, 

* J, H. Newman, ‘ Apologia pro Vita Sua, pp. 373, 374- 


The Life of Farth. 337 


"we find no sanction of an imperious dogmatism in any 
of its books. Christ, indeed, spake ‘with authority, 
and not as the Scribes and Pharisees ;’ but His ‘ autho- 
rity’ was the natural tone of One who proclaimed: 
Himself a special messenger from heaven, and not 
the accent of intellectual despotism. We do not ex- 
pect a traveller who alone has explored a continent or 
discovered an island to speak as if we were entitled to 
balance our notions against his knowledge; nor would it 
be appropriate for the commissioner of a great monarch 
to address the people of a remote dependency with 
bated breath and deferential mien, as if they were on 
an equality with their ruler. If, therefore, Christ had 
not spoken with authority, it would have been an evi- 
dent token that He was not really conscious of having 
come from God. But it will be observed that if the 
tone of Christ’s speech proved that He Himself was free 
from that slavish subjection to the yoke of tradition 
which distinguished the professional teachers of Israel, 
it no less clearly showed that He had none of their 
arrogance towards the common people, and earnestly 
desired to make His hearers free also. The Rabbins 
were living phonographs mechanically repeating the 
words of others who had gone before, and their original 
contributions were seldom more than ingenious illus- 
trations of ancient doctrines or subtle discriminations 
of legal points. But if they slavishly adhered to the 
dicta of their respective schools, they gave no greater 
liberty to their own auditors, and made little or no 
appeal to the private judgments of their disciples. It 
may be doubted whether a more dogmatic teaching 
caste ever existed, or one more abjectly obeyed. But 
22 


338 The Mystery of God. 


Christ, in breaking loose from conventional restraints 
‘asa teacher, of necessity invited the people to assert 
their own liberty at least to learn of whom they would. 
Only by revolting from the domination of their esta- 
blished teachers could they accept the yoke and 
burden of the new Master; and one chief inducement 
to make this choice was the singular blending in Christ 
of meekness and lowliness of heart with that sublime 
tone of personal authority which, mightier even than 
the ‘accent of conviction,’ gave assurance that He 
knew the things whereof He spoke. 

Christ said little about the ‘right of private judg- 
ment,’ but this was because He raised the question 
into a higher region. He taught not merely that men 
have a right to use their faculties independently in the. 
pursuit of truth, but that it is their duty so to do, and 
that they are responsible to God for the due discharge 
of this most primary obligation. We may even go 
beyond this statement. He ‘assumed that men are not 
only called upon to exercise their private judgment as 
a duty, but that they are unable to avoid doing so, 
however much they may dislike the task. The refusal 
to consider what is presented as religious truth is itself 
a momentous and decisive exercise of the reason ; and 
the relinquishment of private judgment, whether in 
deference to an order or Church, or to the power of 
public opinion, is a serious dereliction of duty. Whether 
the refusal be due to mental indolence, or to the fear of 
consequences, or to that vague shrinking from respon- 
sibility which makes the decision of important ques- 
tions a thing of dread to so many—however brought 
about, and however excused, it constitutes an act of 


Lhe Life of Faith. 339 


private judgment of the most stupendous sort. There 
is no more terrible exertion of the living energies than 
the act of suicide; so there is no more extreme usage 
of free thought than that which resigns the right to 
think. In agreement with these principles, Christ 
called upon men to take heed how they heard His 
words, and said that by those words they would be 
judged. By refusing to hear His voice, they took upon 
themselves the responsibility of treating Him as one 
who had no claim on their allegiance, no fitness to be 
the guide and leader of their lives; and by remaining 
under the tutorship of men who hated Him, they elected 
to run the risks of refusing one who claimed to be the 
Prophet for whom their fathers had waited for so many 
centuries, and concerning whom it had been said of old, 
“The Lord thy God will raise up unto thee a Prophet 
from the midst of thee, of thy brethren, like unto me; 
unto Him ye shall hearken . . . . And it shall come to 
pass, that whosoever will not hearken unto My words 
which He shall speak in My name, I will require it of 
him’ (Deut. xvili. 15, 19). 

What Christ demanded of all men everywhere, was 
therefore distinctly an act of private judgment, and, 
according to Him, character is most vividly exhibited 
in the manner in which this demand is met. He called 
upon men so far to assert their personal responsibility 
as to sever themselves, if needs be, from father and 
mother, and wife and children: and when the acknow- 
ledgment of Himself as the Messiah was visited with 
that excommunication which reduced the outcast to 
the level of a Samaritan dog, He still approved and 
advised the sacrifice as one which ought to be made. 

22-2 


340 3 The Mystery of God. 


_ This mode of appeal to the individual conscience and 

reason, which prevails in all Christ’s public and private 
teachings, is no less characteristic of the Apostles. 
When Peter preached the gospel at Pentecost, he 
pressed for an individual change of mind, and, in one 
very significant sentence, pointed out that the great 
danger which beset his hearers was that of being sub- 
merged as personal units in the great flood of national 
prejudice and antagonism to Christ. ‘Save yourselves,’ 
cried he, ‘from this crooked generation’ (Acts ii. 40),. 
ie., Let each man save himself by separating his 
personal thought and conduct, and so his personal 
destiny, from the common mass of Israel. 

In all his preaching, Paul pursued the same course.. 
He said, ‘ Believe,’ but always gave reasons why men 
should believe. In addressing audiences of his own 
countrymen, he reasoned with them out of those 
Hebrew Scriptures which they already recognised as: 
Divine, and praised the Bereans as noble, because 
candid and bold enough to search those ancient docu- 
ments afresh to see whether the things he affirmed 
‘were so or not.’ When standing before philosophers 
on Mars’ Hill, he did not quote those Scriptures of 
which they, as foreigners, were ignorant, or which they 
were at any rate unprepared to regard as authoritative ; 
but he reasoned with them on philosophic grounds, and 
even quoted their own poets and teachers in confirma- 
tion of the truths he preached. Every missionary 
sermon was an appeal to private judgment, and a 
summons to each hearer to tear himself away from the 
creeds and customs of his fathers, if the gospel com- 
mended itself to his conscience as true. 


The Life of Farth. 341 


Nothing is more obvious in the New Testament than 
the constancy and boldness with which it thus addresses 
man as a reasonable being. It probably contains as 
many cautions against credulity as invitations to believe. 
It courts inquiry. It deprecates thoughtlessness, neglect, | 
prejudice, pride, bigotry, irrational belief in idols, and 
indolent subjection to presumptuous teachers or hoary 
tradition. It tells men to try the spirits of pretended 
apostles and prophets, and to test all things and cleave 
only to what is found true and good. Unless, therefore, 
we are prepared to repudiate the Author and first 
preachers of Christianity as exponents of its first 
principles, the Roman view of faith as a submission of 
the mind to authority must be dismissed as an eccle- 
siastical invention. 

Another view of faith which needs correction is that 
which regards it as a mere intellectual assent to the 
truth of certain propositions when sustained by adequate 
proofs. This is regarded by Rome as essentially the 
Protestant doctrine, and by many Agnostics 1s discussed 
as the only alternative which remains when authority 
has been cast off. But assent to the truth of demon- 
strated propositions cannot properly be called faith. 
It is conviction, but convictions are of different kinds. 
The right solution of a mathematical problem secures 
conviction, whenever it is understood, but this is rather 
the reception of knowledge than the awakening of faith. 
Faith only comes into play in relation to things beyond 
sight, and has for its objects things which have not yet 
been, or things which, by scientific methods, perhaps, 
‘never can be proved.’ 

Protestants have often lost sight of this distinction, 


342 The Mystery of God. 


and with most disastrous results; but in the Scriptures 
‘it is never obscured. Faith is defined as ‘the assurance 
of things hoped for, the proving of things not seen,’ 
and the Bible is suffused with this idea from beginning 
toend. The only faith to which moral value is ascribed, 
is that personal trust in God which distinguished 
Abraham, and was ‘counted unto him for righteous- 
ness. The biographical sketches which abound in the 
Old Testament are all so written as to illustrate this 
principle. When Paul was charged with subverting the 
ancient religion of Israel by his doctrine of Faith, he was 
able to quote Genesis to show that it was not new; and 
the author of the Epistle to the Hebrews exhibits the 
continuity of God’s ways throughout all dispensations, 
by calling over the muster-roll of ancient heroes who, 
by faith in God, waxed strong and brave, and died in 
peaceful expectation of things not seen. The laws of 
Moses presupposed and called into exercise this faith 
in God. The great burden of psalms and prophecies 
was ‘trust in the Lord.’ Those proverbial sayings 
which express the homelier thoughts of Hebrew sages 
about life and duty, are steeped in the conviction that 
faith in God is the beginning of wisdom and the in- 
dispensable condition of a happy and righteous course. 

But while this trust in God as a Person must not be 
confounded with a mere intellectual assent to certain 
affirmations concerning Him, it is no less important to 
observe that, without some assent, it can have no exist- 
ence. Endeavours have been made by some of the 
choicest spirits of our time—and, in England, most 
notably by the late Professor T. H. Green, of Oxford— 
to emancipate Faith asa spiritual state from all de- 


The Life of Faith. 343 


pendence on historic beliefs. In so faras this may have 
exhibited the profound difference between the two things, 
and the infinitely higher value of the one than the other, 
a great service has been rendered to religion. But two 
things may be distinguishable in thought, and have 
exceedingly different qualities and uses in fact, while | 
the lesser may be quite indispensable to the production 
and existence of the greater. The roots, stem, branches 
and leaves of a tree are distinguishable from each other, 
and from the fruit, which is the crown of all; but no 
man hopes to cultivate grapes except upon a vine. 
Similarly those spiritual states and those Christ-like 
deeds which writers of this school esteem so highly, 
are, according to their own admissions, scarcely to be 
found at present, except in conjunction with those 
historic beliefs which they seek to dispense with. 
Therefore, judging from experience, they can only be 
expected hereafter to flourish where men feel themselves 
united to Christ as branches of the ‘ True Vine,’ and 
have faith in the Living Father as ‘ the Husbandman.’ 

The endeavour to retain the warmth and light of 
spiritual Christianity by those who despair of over- 
coming the current scientific and philosophic objections 
to a supernatural revelation, is one which no Christian 
who understands the conflict of our age can view 
without intensest sympathy. Its leaders are, for the 
most part, men who have felt the force of that current 
which sweeps some towards the Romish Church as a 
haven of rest from intellectual strife and the sense of per- 
sonal responsibility, but who have noless been influenced 
by that opposing stream whereby others are carried into 
a cold Agnosticism. Though moved in turn by each 


344 The Mystery of God. 


of these strong floods, they anticipate with dismay the 
bourne to which either would conduct. Recognising in 
the Christian life the highest type of human character, 
they cherish an intense desire to have Christ living again 
in themselves, to be imbued with His spirit of holy love, 
and to do those works which no man can do ‘except 
God be with him.’ Hence they inquire, What can 
hinder us from appropriating all the spiritual benefits of 
Christianity while ceasing to concern ourselves about its 
historic evidences ? 

My reply to this question is that I know of no valid 
objection to such an appropriation of these spiritual 
benefits, provided that the historic evidences are not 
left alone because suspected of unsoundness. If a 
man be ignorant of the attacks upon these evidences 
made by so many in our day, but is spiritually con- 
vinced of the truth of all he reads in his New Testa- 
ment, there is no reason why he should be asked 
to suspend his faith until he has studied Christian 
apologetics. Or, if a student has learned, through 
much mental strife, to put more trust in his srfiritual 
discernments than in the results of logical processes 
or critical research; and if, on the strength of his 
spiritual discernment of Christ, he is able to dismiss 
from his mind all doubts respecting the historical form 
in which the Eternal Life was manifested centuries 
since in Judea, his position is one which I should not 
care to disturb. But when it is proposed to treat as 
immaterial the actual truth or falsity of such central 
and essential facts as the superhuman works and claims 
of Christ and His bodily resurrection, I most earnestly 
deprecate the attempt. The spiritual discernment of 


The Life of Farth. 345 


spiritual things may fairly be deemed higher and more 
trustworthy for religious purposes than any other kind 
of knowledge. It may justly be allowed to secure our 
assent to propositions which might otherwise be re- — 
garded as inadequately proved; and, as a matter of 
experience, it no doubt does very often precede, and 
largely contribute to induce, an intellectual acceptance 
of the Christian evidences. But these admissions in 
no degree sanction the supposition that spiritual faith 
can be rationally entertained in defiance of a previous 
intellectual dissent, and in conjunction with an admis- 
sion that science and philosophy have proved the most 
important statement in the Gospels to be absolutely 
incredible. It is true, as Hegel said, that ‘religion must 
contain nothing but religion: and as such it contains 
only eternal spiritual truth.’* But it is also true, as 
he himself acknowledged, that a certain historical form 
is necessary. The idea must have the side of reality ; 
and reality implies circumstantial surroundings in space 
and time.f We may also yield our cordial assent to 
his plea that we must not be misled by the fact of an 
historical appearance into elevating the particulars of 
that history to the rank of spiritual truths. The spiri- 
tual cannot be attested by the external.{ In this 
contention he laid down a canon by which Christian 
advocates may judiciously be guided; for it is onlya 
philosophic adaptation of Christ’s words to Peter, 
‘Flesh and blood hath not revealed it unto thee.’ 
But when from this principle Hegel proceeds to 
draw the inference, that the whole question of 


* ‘ Philosophie der Religion’: G. W. F. Hegel (Vol. I., p. 152). 
+ Ibid., Vol. IL., p. 236. tdbid.,Vol IL, py 160. 


346 The Mystery of God. 


miracles need not trouble us, the conclusion must 
be pronounced unjustifiable. If we are prepared to 
regard the external as sufficiently attested by the 
spiritual, we may leave the ordinary evidences of the 
external unexamined. But if the historical form in 
which the religion of Christ is presented to us be 
deemed incredible, the spiritual idea cannot reasonably 
be received as true. Hence, without contending that 
faith must be preceded by historical investigations or 
by arguments to prove a miraculous revelation possible, 
I submit that whenever the Christian idea is touched 
by denial or doubt on ‘the side of reality,’ that denial 
or that doubt must be removed if spiritual faith is to 
survive; and this is more certainly necessary if this 
faith is to have sufficient vital energy and convincing 
power to propagate itself in other minds. 

When men have fled from the noise and tumult of 
controversial battle-fields, to sit at the feet of Christ 
and learn of Him the secret of a pure and noble life, it 
is an unwelcome task to call them back again. But if 
they have fled from those fields as defeated men, while 
we are convinced that a victory might be theirs if they 
returned; if we are assured that such a flight from 
conflict, by men whose services are sorely needed, makes 
the battle harder for those who remain ; and if, further- 
more, we are persuaded that a real defeat in the battle 
thus abandoned must entail the separation of mankind 
from the Christ they cleave to with so sincere but so 
illogical an attachment, then we must not allow sym- 
pathy with their spiritual aspirations to silence our 
expostulations. Not to take away from them ‘the 
better part,’ but to make its choice a possible and 


The Life of Farth. 347 


reasonable thing for themselves and many more, we 
must persist in the endeavour to show that the Christ 
they admire is a truly historic Christ, and that His 
resurrection from the dead is a fact against which 
science and philosophy can bring no valid objection, 
while its historic evidences are unshaken by criticism 
and research. 

A merely intellectual assent to these opinions is 
incomparably inferior to a loyal and loving reception 
of spiritual influence, but men will soon cease to sit at 
the feet of Christ when the history of His life is pre- 
sented as a thing of divinest beauty, but of which wise 
men doubt the truth. A loving delight in the beauty of 
Christ’s image is good, and may for a season do good, 
although its main features are deemed fictitious, but it 
is not faith in Him such as the Apostles avow and 
inculcate. The endeavour to reproduce His life asa 
painter seeks to actualize a subjective ideal, while 
perpetually baffled by its loveliness, is a totally different 
thing from the imitation of Him as an exemplar to 
whom the Almighty God has destined us to be con- 
formed, and who Himself is offered as a pledge, as well 
as a pattern, of what we shall one day attain. Paul 
said, ‘ That life which I now live in the flesh I live in 
faith, the faith which is in the Son of God, who loved 
me and gave Himself up for me’; but if the elements of 
historic fact are eliminated from that confession, the 
whole meaning dies out of the words. All the con- 
straint and inspiration of which Paul was conscious 
were due to his sense of personal relationship with a 
Christ who had proved His love in certain historic 
deeds of sacrifice, and still lived to carry on the work 


348 The Mystery of God. 


of a guiding Friend and Redeemer to its completion 
“in the heavenly world. Where this belief is exchanged 
for denials or doubts of the facts alleged, the mighty 
motive power of personal obligation perishes, and the 
hope of ever being like Christ becomes indeed— 
‘ The desire of the moth for the star, 
Of the night for the morrow, 
The devotion to something afar 

From the sphere of our sorrow.’ 

When the nature and sphere of faith are thus under- 
stood, the ordinary objections which are preferred 
against the place it occupies in the Christian system 
are found to refer to something else of which the Bible 
knows nothing. It does not pretend to be scientific 
knowledge, therefore Agnosticism has no contradiction 
to offer without violating its own philosophy. Certain 
‘individuals who call themselves Agnostics, but who 
might most fittingly retain the more antiquated title 
‘ Atheist,’ are loud in their denials of what Christians 
believe, but herein they presumptuously affect a know- 
ledge of the Unknowable. Wiser men have no sym- 
pathy with such negative dogmatism. Professor 
Huxley, who claims ‘a sort of patent right’ in the 
word ‘ Agnostic,’ and says ‘It is my trade-mark,’ wrote 
a letter lately in which he reminded a certain rather 
intrusive correspondent that ‘true Agnosticism will not 
forget that existence, motion, and law-abiding opera- 
tions in nature are more stupendous miracles than any 
recounted by the mythologies, and that there may be 


things, not only in the heavens and earth, but beyond — 


the intelligible universe, which “are not dreamt of in 


our philosophy.”’ J. 5. Mill, after speaking of the 4 


q 
‘ 
. 
\ 
‘ 


The Life of Fazth. 349° 


moral sublimity and historic genuineness of the gospel 
pictures of Jesus Christ, also adds ‘that, to the con- 
ception of the rational sceptic, it remains a possibility 
that Christ actually was what He supposed Himself to: 
be ...a man charged with a special, express and 
unique commission from God to lead mankind to truth 
and virtue.” Clearly, then, without violating its own 
philosophy, Agnosticism can make no denials and no: 
assertions which are fatal to the Christian faith. When 
man draws a line, and says, ‘ Here knowledge ceases, 
but we know that something else exists,’ he cannot 
treat the unknown as non-existent. Still, thought 
irresistibly goes on. The lines which run out from 
each human centre of observation and inquiry do not 
terminate abruptly where the horizon melts away into 
infinitude. - According to their understanding of things 
visible, men will inevitably form conceptions of the 
Eternal Cause of All. Even those who most strenu- 
ously refuse to regard this Power as a legitimate object 
of concern, or as a Being towards whom we can have 
any relative duties, do thereby make an immense 
assertion concerning the Unknown. In the face of 
man’s religious instincts and history, it is an enormous 
assumption to affirm that we can have no relations 
with an invisible Mind and Will. The philosophy 
which says man cannot discover God or transcend the 
knowledge of phenomena, should not pretend to say 
that the Maker of man is unable to know our minds, or 
unable to send into our world a ‘ knowable’ messenger, 
such as Mill concedes Christ may have been. Rational 
scepticism, therefore, is compelled by its own insistance 
on the limits of possible knowledge to make room for 


350 The Mystery of God. 


such faith as Christianity enjoins. Probably one of 
the most hopeful signs of the present day is the sub- 
sidence of that arrogant assumption of scientific 
omniscience which is marked by the widespread 
acceptance of the term Agnostic. 

Again, the Biblical conception of faith is untouched 
by assaults on dogma as inferior to conduct. Under 
various forms these attacks have been launched against 
Christianity, in the supposed interests of morality, from 
the days of Paul’s Judaizing opponents to those of 
the Hellenic Matthew Arnold. Mr. Arnold must be 
honoured for the zeal which he displays for righteous- _ 
ness; but I fear that the Apostle Paul would say of his 
modern exponent, as he said of his original opponents, 
that his zeal is ‘not according to knowledge.’ Virtue 
is better than dogma, beyond all question. But the 
great practical problem is, How shall vicious men be 
made virtuous? How shall selfishness, out of which 
legions of evil deeds proceed to devastate our social 
fields, be cast out of human hearts? How shall bitter- 
ness be made sweet, and darkness be turned into light? 
Neither literature nor dogma can do this. J. S. Mill 
observed (in words already quoted) that ‘ it would not 
be easy even for an unbeliever to find a better trans- 
lation of virtue from the abstract to the concrete than 
to endeavour so to live that Christ would approve our 
life’ When he wrote this he may possibly have for- 
gotten that a life devoid of active love for God would 
never be approved by Christ, and that such a life of 
unworldly zeal as he commends is far removed from 
one of mere respect for social duties. But walving 
this criticism, and taking the passage to refer to human 


Lhe Life of Faith. 351 


relations of justice and mercy, kindness, truth, purity, 
gentleness, and love, it may serve to enforce a higher 
truth. | 

Let us take three representative men. Let the first - 
be a man who endorses Mill’s idea, but is an unbeliever 
in Christ—thinks Him a mere‘man who died and was 
buried ages ago, and therefore can have no personal 
relations with the present generation of men even asa 
distant spectator. Let the second be a man who holds 
his opinion about Christ in suspense. He is what Mill 
calls a ‘rational sceptic’—not affirming or denying, but 
allowing some mild hope of the truth of Christ’s Divine 
commission to tincture his thoughts. Let the third be 
a man who verily believes that Jesus Christ still lives and 
reigns, and watches over every human life with the 
same care as He bestowed upon His followers on earth, 
and that He is a Judge by whom God will try the 
secrets. of all hearts, making manifest the obscurest 
characters, and vindicating those who are defamed and 
wrongfully treated by their fellows. Which of these 
three men will be the more likely to live as Christ 
‘would approve’? On whom will the thought of de- 
serving so pure an approbation be most animating ? 
Will it be the first, who is sure Christ is a mere dead 
Worthy ? or the second, who is only half persuaded that 
the tale has truth ? or the third, who in the darkest hours 
of misjudgment can say like Paul, ‘ There is laid up for 
me the crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the 
righteous Judge, shall give to me at that day: and not 
to me only, but also to all them that have loved His 
appearing’? 

There can be but one answer to such a question, 


352 The Mystery of God. 


Ayee 
and it alone should be decisive ; but other considera- 
- tions may be adduced to show how the Christian faith 
operates in favour of morality. 

Such faith helps to remove the most productive causes. 
of evil. One of the most potent of these causes is a 
feeling that men must look after their own interests, 
because no one else can be trusted to do it for them. 
They see others engrossed in selfish pursuits, while 
they themselves are pushed and elbowed in the crowd, 
often having to bear hardness, injustice, and neglect ; 
and this first irritates the worst feelings, and then tends 
to petrify the heart. But the thought of God’s fatherly 
care and love revealed in Christ is a new fountain of 
love towards man, and one can learn to love his neigh- 
bour, and even his enemies, when convinced that the 
Good Samaritan is a type of Him who reigns over all 
the world. 

Another potent cause of evil is hopelessness. Men 
have done wrong, and sullied their own souls; and if 
they have tried to purify their own affections, and 
create within themselves a spirit like that admired in 
Jesus, they have wofully failed. How, then, can they 
go on striving? But faith in God revealed in Christ 
is confidence in God’s mercy to blot out the past; it 
is reliance on God’s power to direct and uphold the 
future walk; and it is an assurance of God’s purpose 
to secure a final and eternal victory over sin. Ani- 
mated by this faith, the vilest characters and the most 
abject and dejected spirits have, in innumerable in- 
stances, arisen to seek after righteousness, and have 
attained a career of usefulness. 

Nor does faith in Christ simply suffice to counteract 


The Life of Farth. 353 
te 

these temptations to positive evil. It exalts the whole 
idea of duty by connecting the work of each passing 
hour with the interests of eternity, and by bringing 
the powers of the world above and of the world to 
come to reinforce the ordinary motives to rectitude. 
In proportion as this faith is clear and strong, it evokes 
a spirit not merely of justice but of sacrifice, and 
reduces to a minimum the pressure of temptation to 
eye-service towards others, and time-service towards 
one’s self. This faith fires men’s souls with a true 
enthusiasm for humanity. There is a small sect of 
man-worshippers which claims a monopoly of this 
virtue, declaring that the binding of religion to a 
superhuman God has failed, and that its fruits have 
only been ‘ dead-sea apples.’ But history shows that 
Christianity was the first to propound the initial idea 
of humanity as one entity. For such a conception 
pagan authors may be ransacked in vain; but the 
Bible is full of it: its pages shine with an enthusiastic 
glow of desire to see all nations welded into one king- 
dom, with one language, one sceptre, and one law. 
Faith in Him who is said to have died to break down 
all partitions, and reconcile mankind in one body to 
God, has created a new order of men and women 
- devoted to the ministry of mankind. Irrespective of 
nation and character, and in the face of hatred and 
persecution, this enthusiasm is now planting cultivated 
men as servants to savages in every quarter of the 
globe where such races remain unreclaimed. The 
author of the so-called ‘ Religion of Humanity’ wrote 
a good many years ago: ‘The noble missionaries of 
our faith will find in Africa the greatest stimulus to 


23 


3am The Mystery of God. 


exert their intellect, and the fairest field for their active 
zeal. They will set themselves the task of spreading 
among the simple African populations the Universal 
religion. There will be no intermediate step, they 
will not be required to pass through either Monotheism 
or even Polytheism. That the success of the effort is 
possible, is the consequence of the profound affinity 
between Positivism and Fetishism.* 

Since these words were written, Christians have had 
enthusiasm enough to explore the Dark Continent, 
and thousands have been found ready to endure exile 
and sickness, and to confront premature death, not 
counting their lives dear unto themselves, for the sake 
of telling Africans of Christ; but no Positivist has to 
my knowledge yet gone out either to elevate or to 
worship humanity in that ‘ fairest field.’ 

Passing from these ethical aspects of our subject, 
t is submitted that faith in God as a Father who 
has made Himself known to His children commends 
itself to us as the only thing which can promise 
satisfaction to our lieakis.’. of He that itrastethyyan 
his own heart’ to construct a scheme of the 
universe is not wise. But when a faith like this is 
founded on rational grounds, and is the direct con- 
tinuance into unseen regions of so many lines of 
knowledge, the fact that it meets the finest feelings of 
man’s nature becomes a strong confirmation of its 
soundness. Any theory of the universe which tramples 
on the affections and aspirations of mankind, and offers 
them dead matter and force whenthey cry for everlasting 
love and life, is self-condemned. Even nature bids us 

* Comte, ‘The Catechism of the Positive Religion,’ p. 365- 


The Life of Faith. 61S) 


refuse to regard our deepest yearnings as tantalizing 
mockeries. Where intense desires are known to exist 
among lower animals, it is invariably found that they 
correspond to satisfactory objects. Inward impulses p 
lead some creatures to do things which have no mean- 
ing to themselves at the time, but which avail to make 
provision for a future state of life. Various insects 
even satisfy their instinctive desires by doing things 
which propagate plants and flowers ; but in no case is 
instinct a useless lie. . How, then, shall we believe this 
of human desires and hopes? If man’s heart—the 
strongest, tenderest, most mysterious and sensitive of 
all known things—be not an organized self-tormenting 
machine, and the cruellest product of blind evolution 
in the world, there is continuance and sequel for the 
affections in a future life and a more than human love 
in Him who made man’s heart. There is logic, as 
well as poetry, in the words of ‘The Wanderer,’ who on 


cries: 
‘And shall I find no Father? Shall my being 
Aspire in vain for ever, and always tend 
To an impossible goal, which none shall reach,— 
An aim without an end ? 


‘Or, shall I heed them when they bid me take 
No care for aught but what my brain may prove? 
I, through whose inmost depths, from birth to death 
Strange heavenward-currents move ; 


b) 


‘Vague whispers, inspirations, memories, 
Sanctities, yearnings, secret questionings, 
And oft amid the fullest blaze of noon, 
The rush of hidden wings ? 


‘Nay; my soul spurns it! Less it is to know 
Than to have faith: not theirs who cast away 
The mind God gave them, eager to adore 
Idols of baser clay. 
23—2 


4”, 
@: 9 


a gs 


356 The Mystery of God. 


‘But theirs, who marking out the bounds of mind, 
And where thought rules, content to understand, 
Know that beyond its kingdom lies a dread 
Immeasurable land. 


‘ A land which is, though fainter than a cloud, 
Full of sweet hopes and awful destinies : 
A dim land, rising when the eye is clear 
Across the trackless seas.’* 

There is a time in many lives when the whole being 
is absorbed and apparently satisfied in the love of 
others at their side. But this time is brief. The in- 
tensity of such love is the measure of the pain it must 
entail on the survivor. All the reverence and sanctity 
of love for parents; all the growing into oneness, and 
the cleaving of soul to soul which hallow married life ; 
‘and all the joy of being trusted by fair children, is as 
the brief sunshine which burns to evening and cold night, 
or as the flowering of plants which beautify the path 
to those sleeping places where dark yews cast their 
shadow, and lettered stones betray the impotence of 
erief. But faith in Christ is faith in Him who said, 
‘Thy brother shall rise again.’ ‘lam the resurrection 
and the life.’ It is a faith which casts a soft light of 
hope on ancient graves, and on the newest turf which 
covers those we have lost. It preaches of high careers 
for those cut off in their prime; and of a Divine 
economy, which does not waste the disciplined ex- 
perience of venerable sires when they go to the grave 
like sheaves of corn fully ripe, nor despise the im- 
maturity of tender babes when cut off like fragile 
blossoms by cold vernal gales. It tells of all the 
workers and watchers of old time gathered into one 


* L. Morris, ‘Songs of Two Worlds,’ p. 84. 


The Life of Farth. aoe 


rejoicing host with those who enter into their labours 
and see the days they toiled and suffered to bring in. 
When a man’s heart is riven by some sudden stroke, 
or dies down under the strain of a protracted grief; 
when his plans are thwarted—his friends untrue or 
gone away; when he feels the infirmities of his own 
nature hindering action, and sin marring his best 
deeds; when in old age he looks out and beholds 
dimness and a cloud, and at the thought of going forth 
into unknown realms his native clinging to familiar 
scenes grow strong; then this faith in the unseen God * 
made known in Christ unfolds the vision of a heritage 
no enemy can wrest away, because the Lord who rules 
throughout the universe has called him ‘ child.’ ‘ 
Finally, while faith, as we have seen, is indispensable 
to any intelligent intercourse with God, and while the 
Christian faith, rightly understood, is consistent with 
any true philosophy, favourable to morality and satisfy- 
ing to the heart, it also commends itself as giving com- 
pleteness and grandeur to our intellectual conceptions 
of the universe. It instructs us that man as a 
spiritual being has relationship not only with the beasts 
of these earthly fields, with the dust of this perishable 
globe, and with the memories of buried ancestors, but 
also with great thinkers and glorified servants who live 
in other worlds. It opens our minds to regard those 
orbs which move with measured harmony in space as 
bound together by a common kingship, and an all- 
embracing moral government, as well as by an all- 
pervading physical order. By such vast and ennobling 
thoughts it lifts the mind out of that insular egotism 
and provincial narrowness which otherwise beset us as 


358 The Mystery of God. 


the tenants of a small and obscure world. This globe 
which seems so vast to its inhabitants is not visible as 
a speck of light from many stars which stud our mid- 
night sky. But faith in a common King and Father 
who has deigned to visit us in Christ unites our history 
and destiny with those of every habitable sphere. 


« Humble lives, to low thought, and low ; but linked to the thinker’s 


eye; 
By a bond that is stronger than death, with the lights of the 
farthest sky.’ 


Physical science can only regard other worlds as 
lonely islands in an untravelled ocean of ether. But 
faith in the moral order and federal unity of the cosmos 

saches us to view them as ‘many mansions’ of one 
great House, between which ceaseless correspondence 
passes, and a holy commerce is maintained by ministers 
of God who do His pleasure. It enables us to regard 
the human race as one out of many tribes in the cosmic 
Israel of God, all journeying towards one Holy Hill of 
beatific vision, and all destined to worship in an Eternal 
Temple which shall be a house of praise for all worlds, 
when the Mystery of God now darkly working shall be 
finished, ‘ according to the good tidings which He de- 
clared to His servants the prophets.’ 


Elliot Stock, Paternoster Row, London. 


Tl Ay yt 


